Self-portrait

The painting is a self-portrait of the Sienese painter Luigi Mussini, one of the major Tuscan exponents of the purist current, dating from around 1858.
The artist is posing at the front and half-torso; a well-groomed mustache and beard frame his slim face. Rather than addressing the viewer directly, he seems to be observing something behind our backs. Elegant even in his home outfit, the painter wears a “work” Cape with green paintings on his shoulders while holding the painting instruments with his hands.
The purity of the drawing and the pictorial finesse, as well as the ease with which the artist presents himself, refer not only in form but also in spirit to the ways of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, whose influence Mussini had had since his stay in Paris from 1848 to 1850.
Exponent of Italian purism, the artist was influenced by Ingres, turning his art toward a radical reform in an idealist and purist manner. His appointment to the direction of the Sienese Academy of Fine Arts, assumed by the artist in 1851, was also a significant factor in propagating this thought in nineteenth-century Italy. Several important painters were formed here, including Prato-born Alessandro Franchi, a favorite student, whose works are preserved in the Museum of Palazzo Pretorio.