French Portraiture
European court art of the 18th Century grew up around the French absolutist model embodied by Versailles. In the field of portrait painting, the Frenchmen Rigaud and Largillierre developed an unchanging typology with heavy draperies, majestic attitudes and the immediately recognizable attributes of power. Through his Venetian training, Fra'Galgario had learned to represent patrician pomp. He nevertheless had to adapt to the French taste which took the Bergamask nobility by storm. ThePortrait d'une dame avec un domestique noir (Portrait of a lady with a black servant) is a good effort in this direction. The chromatic treatment of the fabrics is of a unique magnificence.
On the other hand, his handling of the refined interior shows a certain lack of precision. It can also be noted how, in the Portrait de l'avocat Bettami de'Bazini, Fra'Galgario makes use of a similar composition to that of Rigaud's Portrait de Germain-Louis de Chauvelin
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