Jacob Philipp Hackert (attributed to) - Lakeland with a backdrop of trees and a hillside view 1776 - oil on canvas 235 x 196 cm The monumental canvas depicts a lake landscape with a backdrop of trees in the centre and on the right, from which there is a wide view of a hilly horizon. The work, signed and dated "1776", belongs to the Roman phase of Jacob Philipp Hackert, one of the most important international landscape painters of the second half of the 18th century, before his definitive affirmation at the Bourbon court in Naples.The composition, articulated on successive planes and marked by tree wings of calibrated monumentality, reveals Hackert's extraordinary ability to combine direct observation of nature with a layout of classical ancestry. In fact, the artist reworks the 17th-century tradition of Lorraine and Poussini, grafting onto it a new luministic and atmospheric focus. The lyrical chromatic balance and analytical rendering of the naturalistic components make this work a paradigmatic example of the 'landscape painting according to nature' that characterises Hackert's maturity.From a biographical point of view, the year 1776 falls within the artist's Roman period. After leaving Germany and France, he came to Italy, first settling in Rome, where he formed relationships with François Boucher, Jean-Honoré Fragonard and Claude Joseph Vernet, and where he began to receive his first aristocratic and collector's commissions. The canvas thus anticipates his Neapolitan phase, which began in 1786 with his appointment as court painter to Ferdinand IV, and which would culminate in 1787 with his meeting with Goethe and the height of his international fortune.The painting is enclosed in its original 18th-century gilded wooden frame, richly carved with plant motifs and decorations of ovules and leaves. The quality of the carving and the perfect stylistic consonance with the work testify to the painting's prestigious destination from the outset, confirming its character as a high-level collector's commission.The work is accompanied by the expertise of Prof. Maurizio Marini.Provenance:Ex: Cardinal Joseph Fesch, Palazzo Ricci, Rome (Sale 1844)Ex: Principi Torlonia, Palazzo Torlonia, RomePrivate Roman collectionBibliography: L. Salerno, I pittori di Fesch, I pittori di Roma, RomeBibliography: L. Salerno, I pittori di Fesch, Rome Salerno, I pittori di vedute in Italia (1580-1830), Rome, 1991, no. 106, pp. 340-351, in particular pp. 341 and 346, no. 6.L. Chiarini, Il paesaggio secondo natura - Jacob Philipp Hackert e la sua cerchia, Rome, 1994, pp. 47 and 59 (passim).