Pietro Fabris

Italian painter and engraver. He worked in Naples for most of his life, but frequently added the phrase 'English painter' to his signature. He is noted for landscapes and genre scenes that illustrate events at the royal court and picturesque scenes of Neapolitan life, including pedlars, fishermen, picnickers and dancers. His works were popular with the British, Americans, and Europeans making the Grand Tour. Two paintings representing the Departure of Charles III of Bourbon for Spain (Palacio Real, Aranjuez) were presumably painted in 1759, when this event occurred. In 1768 Fabris exhibited in London at the Free Society and accompanied the British envoy, Sir William Hamilton, to Sicily; he included a portrait of this enthusiastic patron in one of two genre scenes showing the Drawing-room in Lord Fortrose's Apartment in Naples (1770; National Picture Gallery, Edinburgh). He exhibited again in London in 1772 at the Society of Artists. Fabris is also noted as one of the first artists in Naples in the 18th century to use gouache as a medium.

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