Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978)

Closely linked to the Trovatore series, Gentiluomo in villeggiatura is an emblematic example of de Chirico's 'New-Metaphysical' style. At the centre of the picture, a colourfully adorned nobleman-type, more human than the traditional Trovatore, yet still clearly part mannequin, his head expressionless, with arms seemingly made of biscuits - another recurring motif since the early Metaphysical period - and his armour reminiscent of his designs for Diaghilev's Ballets russes of the late 1920s. He stands alone before a white picket fence, an unexplainably miniature horse and some maps and a small castle on the green ground. The confident contrapposto stance and the unsheathed sword behind him mock the high aspirations of this creature, apparent lord of a miniature noble estate.

The Gentiluomo mannequin is a unique character, compared with the traditional Trovatore that appeared more frequently through de Chirico’s career. The Gentiluomo is invested with a greater sense of life absent from the mechanical Trovatore and the early Metaphysical works in general. The insertion of the biscuits are elements of reality, reproduced in a most tactile fashion and hark back to his Ferrara period. The colours have been given a new brightness and the light of the scene has become warmer. The darkening sky is here substituted with a patterned background, reminiscent of a stage set, the vertical pattern swirling downwards like the folds of the stage curtain.