ROTARY Pietro Antonio Dei

September 30, 1707 (Verona) - August 31, 1762 (St. Petersburg)

painter and graphic artist.

Studied in Verona at the painter and engraver, A. Balestra R. Audenarde, in 1725 he moved to Venice, where he continued his artistic education at D.-B. Piazzetta, in 1727 some time he lived in Rome, worked in the studio of the painter F. Trevizani. He then went to Naples for three years, the advice of F. Solimena. In 1734 he settled in Verona, where he opened his own school of painting. Became known in Italy as a historical painter. He had the title of Count.

Since 1750 he worked in Vienna at the Court of Maria Theresa, became acquainted with J. E. Lyotard, whose influence is felt in his art. Then he moved to Dresden, was at the court of the Elector of Saxony and king of Poland August III. In 1756 he was invited to the Russian service of Empress Elizabeth, in May of that year, arrived in St. Petersburg. Received the title of court painter.

lived in his house on Bolshaya Morskaya Street, which opened a private school of painting, in 1758-1759 it is visited AP Antropov and FS rumble. In the workshop, together with the students wrote "women's heads", who enjoyed great popularity among customers: under them have a special room in the palaces and manors - for example, "The Cabinet of fashion and grace" in the Grand Peterhof Palace, "Rotary Room" at the China Palace Oranienbaum, Salon Rotary in the Moscow suburb Manor Yusupov Arkhangelsk. Many worked as a portraitist, has created portraits of Empress Elizabeth, Grand Duchess Catherine Alekseevny (the future Empress Catherine II), Princess A. Golitsyn, Countess VP Sheremetev and AM ; Vorontsova, Francesco Rastrelli, and others. From 1757 he taught at the Academy of Arts of three of the most illustrious.

Rotary - one of the leading painters of the Elizabethan time, the representative of the rococo style. He arrived in Russia already established master who had won success in Dresden and Warsaw. The bulk of his creative heritage make up the so-called "women's heads", in which the artist varied image of several models - in different costumes with different attributes, turns heads. The most common motif pictures Rotary was reading a love letter. Chamber, imbued with the idyllic mood and subtle sensitivity, they were perceived by contemporaries as the combined images of joy, tenderness, gentle sadness.

The essential problem is the separation of original works of Rotary and the work of his students and followers.

Rotary works are in many Russian and European museums, including the State Tretyakov Gallery, State Russian Museum, State Hermitage, the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and others.