Some years ago we were donated a jigsaw puzzle, formerly belonging to a sadly deceased neighbour.  For years the puzzle languished in storage until I recently unearthed it. Looking at what the puzzle’s theme would have depicted on completion I immediately exclaimed ‘a chocolate box, schmaltzy concoction.’ My wife, however, liked the picture of two ladies playing a game of chess with a young gentleman looking thoughtfully on.

She persuaded me to appreciate the incredible skill of the painter in depicting the intricate embroidery of the ladies’ sumptuous dresses and the extraordinary re-evocation of the salon’s tapestries. True, there was much skill shown in representing these feature (I just wonder how many contemporary artists could, or would want to, paint in this way). Just look at how the delicate coffee cups and the silver sugar salver are detailed or how the embroidery on the man’s coat is worked or how the mirror’s gold gilding or how the floor’s marbling have been rendered. Absolutely stunning and quite masterful!

With the current pandemic confining us to long hours at home and with time freely available we have been encouraged to use these weird days in various ways, one of which is to have fun in doing jigsaw puzzles. I finally decided that the jigsaw’s picture was a little bit more than just chocolate boxy and investigated its painter, an Italian of course. Arturo Ricci was born in Florence on 19th April 1854 and died in 1919. He studied in Florence under Tito Conti (1842-1924), who was highly regarded for “the grace of his figures, precision of drawing and strength of his colours” but whose artistic skills Ricci was to greatly surpass. Like his master, Ricci (not to be confused with the far better known and appreciated Venetian baroque painter Sebastian Ricci (Belluno, 1659 – Venice 1734)) became a painter of genre and family life scene. His clients included rich travellers on the European ‘grand tour’, particularly Americans who saw in his elegant scenes a more leisurely and glamorous pre-industrial revolution world brimful of rustling silks and shimmering satins.

However, it was also said of Arturo Ricci that “he paints too well for his subject.”  I cannot quite disagree.

Clearly Ricci fused two strands in his artistic creations: one was the intimate world of domestic interiors of such eighteenth century artists as the Venetian Pietro Longhi and the Frenchman Chardin. The other was the transcendent pastoral world of Watteau which I first discovered in my own school’s picture gallery:

(Watteau: Les Plaisirs du Bal. Dulwich Picture Gallery, London)

Arturo Ricci’s rococo-reminiscent art reminded me that there was, indeed, a neo-rococo revival in the latter part of the nineteenth century. In London the concurrence of eighteenth and nineteenth century versions of the sinuously decorative style known as rococo are displayed to perfection in the examples on display at the outstanding Wallace collection. (I think that’s the museum I shall head to first when this bloody virus is finally vanquished!).

Italy, too, has had its neo-rococo revival and it’s not only in painting, fashion and furniture but music too. Puccini’s third opera and first major success, ‘Manon Lescaut’, sets an eighteenth century novel by Prévost to music which often incorporates eighteenth century forms, including the minuet.  I do not doubt that a part of the overwhelming success of ‘Manon Lescaut’s première in 1893 had to do with the rococo revival in the arts. I also have no reservation that, particularly in its use of lithe floral motifs, neo-rococo paved the way for Art Nouveau, or ‘Stile Liberty’ as it is known in Italy.

I think I should add something about the history and therapeutic value of jigsaw puzzles. John Spisbury of London is thought to have made the first jigsaw puzzle in 1760 by using a marquetry saw. Puzzles were later produced on geographic themes (‘dissected maps’) for children’s education and occasionally on political subjects.

Ironically, the jigsaw’s greatest popularity to-date has been during the Great Depression of the 1930’s. I wonder if there will be any similar correlation in our present age. However, there is one point on which many psychologists concur: doing jigsaw puzzles can help reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and, furthermore, become an important aid in preserving one’s sanity.

So begin your own jig-saw puzzle…starting with the edges, of course!

A thousand thanks to my wife, Alexandra Pettitt, for having encouraged me to appreciate the artwork of Arturo Ricci, quite apart from having received and kept the jigsaw puzzle themed with one of the painter’s most charming and accomplished works.