Alessandro Rosi (1627-1697)

This painting depicts the decisive event that directly led to the Trojan War. We see a scene set at the wedding of King Peleus and the gorgeous Nereid, Thetis. Zeus had invited all the Gods to take part in the celebrations on Mount Olympus, except for the ever-divisive Eris, as he feared she would sow discord. Predictably, Eris did not appreciate being snubbed in this manner, and she decided to disrupt the feast by depositing a golden ball upon the table, inscribed with the words “To the fairest one”. This sparked a dispute between Hera, Athena and Aphrodite, who all argued that the ball was rightfully theirs. Zeus was reluctant to get involved, and instead sent the goddesses to Paris for adjudication. Hermes presented the problem to the young man, who agreed to shoulder the task. All three goddesses then sought to persuade the youthful Paris to decide in their favour. Hera, the goddess of power, promised him unrivalled wealth and the entirety of Asia as his kingdom. Athena, the goddess of wisdom, offered him supreme martial fame and the power of the deepest wisdom. But the goddess of love, Aphrodite, sought to win him over by praising him as the most handsome man in all of Phrygia. And since the most handsome man obviously deserved nothing less than the loveliest of all women, she promised Paris that he would win the love of Helen, the most beautiful woman on Earth and wife of Menelaus, King of Sparta. Paris was persuaded, and he gave the golden ball to Aphrodite, to the bitter disappointment of Athena and Hera.

Paris travelled to Sparta to collect on Athena’s promise, and true to her word, she caused Helen to fall in love with Paris at first sight, abandoning her husband for the Trojan prince. When the news was broken to Menelaus, his wrath was tremendous, and with the help of his brother Agamemnon, he set sail for Troy with a thousand ships to reclaim his wife. The Trojan War had begun.

Alessandro Rosi was an Italian artist in the Baroque period. He trained in the workshops of Jacopo Vignali and Cesare Dandini, and likely also took an educational trip to Rome, where he saw the works of Simon Vouet and Giovanni Lanfranco. Baldinucci, his biographer, described him as having the extravagant temperament of an artist. Rosi enjoyed the patronage of some of the most important Florentine families of the time, such as the Corsinis and the Rinuccinis, for whom he undertook large decorative projects. He also produced a series of ten designs for tapestries commissioned by Cosimo III de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. His most prominent student was Alessandro Gherardini. Rosi died in Florence at the age of seventy, when he was struck by a falling column while walking along the Via Condotta. Unfortunately, little more is known about his life.  His works were often confused with those of other artists, such as Sigismondo Coccapini, and have recently gained new appreciation among critics after centuries of obscurity.

It was not unusual for Alessandro Rosi to paint multiple versions of the same composition; indeed, he portrayed the Judgment of Paris numerous times, and the composition seen here exists in several different executions. One such painting was part of the Wildenstein collection in New York and was auctioned at Sotheby’s New York in 2013. This Wildenstein canvas is very similar, but differs in a number of details, such as the placement of the conch and the absence of the flute in the left foreground. It also has a different background. Another very similar painting can be found in Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, with only very minor differences, such as in the detailing of the pearls in Hera’s hair (upper left) and a few twigs in the background. The painting described here stands out for the detailed rendition of the faces of the three goddesses in the upper left corner, and the cloudy sky in the background.