Marcello

Adèle D'affry (1836-1879) Herzogin von Castiglione Colonna

This catalogue accompanies the travelling exhibition of the work of the artist Adèle Colonna, Duchess of Castiglione Altibrandi (1836–1879). She was actually born Adèle d’Affry in Switzerland and created her sculptures and paintings under the pseudonym “Marcello.” The death of her husband, Carlo di Catiglione Colonna, left the Roman duchess a widow at a young age and free to pursue her career as a sculptress in Paris, where she exhibited her works at the Salon from 1863. She soon established a reputation in Switzerland and Italy, too. In this lavishly illustrated book, the reader will discover the sculptures, paintings, and drawings of Marcello, in which neoclassicism competes with more modern influences. Her works are placed in relation to those by other artists of the age, such as Gustave Courbet, Eugène Delacroix, Berthe Morisot, Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, and Henri Regnault, as well as being correlated with photographs from her archives which shed considerable light on Marcello’s oeuvre.

The story of Adèle d’Affry provides an opportunity to study the emergence of women artists in the nineteenth century in general and affords an insight into the subjects they were most fond of and were keenest to depict. This work analyses the art milieux that developed in Rome and Paris around the year 1870, the influence of Spanish art at the time, and the role played by fashionable salons.

Laure Chabanne is head curator at the Musée du Second Empire and at the Musée de l’Impératrice, as well as curator of paintings and artworks at the Musée national du château de Compiègne.
Simone de Reyff is emeritus professor of French Literature at the University of Fribourg.
Grégoire Extermann is an art historian and the author of various studies on sixteenth- and nineteenth-century Italian sculpture.
Pascal Griener is a professor in the Institut d’Histoire de l’Art et de Muséologie at the University of Neuchâtel.
Gianna A. Mina is the director of the Museo Vincenzo Vela in Ligornetto and Chair of the Association of Swiss Museums.
Édouard Papet is head curator at the Musée d’Orsay, Paris.
CaterinaY.Pierre is associate professor of Art History at Kingsborough Community College, City University of New York.
Fabien Python is a lecturer and PhD student at the University of Fribourg/ATILF Nancy.
Francis Python is emeritus professor of Contemporary, General, and Swiss History at the University of Fribourg.
Caroline Schuster Cordone is Deputy Director of the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire in Fribourg.
Monique von Wistinghausen is an historian and Chair of the Marcello Foundation in Fribourg.