Print, 'Democritus in Meditation', Salvator Rosa, Rome, 1662

Although none of Salvator Rosa's etchings are dated, this etching is traditionally ascribed to a date around 1662 as it appears mentioned in letter of Rosa dated 11 March 1662. The present work belongs to Rosa’s group of larger etchings executed in the 1660s and depicts the Ancient philosopher Democritus staring down at symbols of death. Democritus was another exponent of the Stoic philosophy which was so deeply admired by Rosa. The present print forms a pair with Diogenes casting away his bowl (see 24448 and 23200:3), which embodies another aspect of the Stoic doctrine. Accounts on Democritus’ life can be found in the Ancient literature, in which the philosopher is usually paired with the weeping Heraclitus.

The association of these two opposite attitudes towards society was popular in the northern countries during the Renaissance and the Baroque period but quite rare in Italy. It is likely that the artist was inspired here by northern models, especially since such influence has been proved elsewhere in his art, notably in his witchcraft scenes. However Rosa has inversed here the traditional roles and transformed the laughing Democritus in the weeping Heraclitus. Thanks to this inversion, Rosa could combine two of his characteristics: the desire to provide original composition and a strong attraction for the genre of the vanitas, which recurs in many paintings. Rosa had a particular taste for complex and intellectual subject matter, which publicised the artist’s stature as a learned painter and peintre-philosophe. This print reproduces in reverse a painting executed some ten years earlier and now in Copenhagen (Statens Museums for Kunst)

The original copperplate is preserved at the Calcografia Nazionale in Rome (Inv. 747i).

Salvator Rosa (1615-1673) was born in Arenella near Naples and soon absorbed the energy and violence informing Neapolitan art, characteristics which would be apparent throughout his career. Rosa was a prolific etcher but he also produced drawings and paintings. He particularly favoured subjects taken from the classical Antiquity, such as in the present case. The print shows here the Ancient philosopher Democritus in meditation staring down at skulls, bones, dead animals and broken vessels arranged as a vanitas still-life and intended as symbols of mortality and evanescence.

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