This early 18th-century oil painting, attributed to Italian artist Giuseppe Pesci (d. 1722), depicts a peacock alongside radiant blooms in a vase. Pesci is known predominantly for his decorative floral ensembles featuring various creatures.

Well, what fun! There’s something entirely barmy yet equally charming about Pesci’s oeuvre, which never fails to raise a smile. Whether it’s a chicken, peacock, slightly unusual monkey, parrot or leaping hound, his animals are fascinating. If one wishes to delve into the deeper associations of these inclusions, it could be suggested that each communicates human traits. Peacocks, for example, are naturally associated with demonstrations of aesthetic ostentation. Exceedingly relevant during the late Baroque/early Rococo period, which was awash with aristocratic excess. In certain cultures, they also represent royalty and power.

Pesci was born in Parma, Italy, and he was formerly known as the monogrammist AV due to an inscription on the reverse of a frame kept in the San Pellegrino Retreat in Bologna. Although little has been unearthed regarding this playful creator, he is known to have worked for several noble families in Parma and Piacenza, such as the Sanvitales in Fontanellato and the Pallavicinos.

Held in a later frame.

Medium: Oil on canvas
Overall size: 38½” x 28” / 98cm x 71cm
Year of creation: c. 1710
Provenance: Fichtel & Sachs Collection, Schweinfurt, Germany / Private collection, Germany.
Condition: Cleaned. Canvas relined. Craquelure throughout. Later stretcher. The paint layer is stable. Frame in good condition with minor age-related wear.
Artist’s auction maximum: £22,302 for ‘Still Life With Flowers, Fruit & Birds (Pair)’, Oil on canvas, Sotheby's, Dipinti Antichi, Milan, 20 May 2008 (lot 183).
Our reference: BRV2163