BARATTA, Giovanni di Isidoro - b. 1670 Carrara, d. 1747 Carrara

Italian sculptor, part of a family of sculptors, nephew of Francesco Baratta (c. 1600-1666). Studying initially in Florence with Giovanni Battista Foggini, he probably learnt to sculpt in bronze with Massimiliano Soldani. He spent four years in Rome, studying during that time with Camillo Rusconi.

Baratta returned in 1697 to Florence, where he created his earliest known work, the over life-size marble and stucco high relief of Tobias and the Angel (1698; Florence, Santo Spirito). Although he maintained a residence in Florence, it is thought that between 1700 and 1709 Baratta made occasional trips to Lucca and Genoa to fulfil commissions. His growing reputation attracted royal patronage. Not only did he work for Victor-Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy and King of Sardinia and Sicily, but also for the kings of Spain, Portugal and Prussia and for Frederick IV, King of Denmark, who, during a visit to Baratta’s studio in 1709, purchased the over life-size marble of Hercules and the Nemean Lion as well as the smaller Orpheus and Eurydice (all Copenhagen, Rosenborg Slot, Park).

Baratta also gained important religious commissions. For the high altar of San Ferdinando in Livorno he executed a number of works, including the marble group of the Freeing of the Slaves (c. 1710-17; in situ). Beginning in 1722 he created sculptures for the interior of Juvarra’s chapel of S Uberto at Venaria Reale, a royal hunting lodge near Turin. Of these, the Four Doctors of the Church (1728) in the niches of the crossing are considered to be his masterpieces. Baratta mediated the marble figures’ gigantic proportions with the light playfulness that characterizes much of his work.

Baratta returned to Carrara sometime before 1725, and in 1731 received the title of Conte. Regarded as more talented than his brothers Pietro Baratta and Francesco Baratta, Giovanni developed a witty elegant style that moved beyond Rusconi’s High Baroque into the Rococo.

Through his long-standing relationship with the sculptor Filippo Juvarra with whom Baratta worked on the Palazzo Madama, Turin, he was introduced to the House of Bourbon in the mid 1730s. It was the quality of his work and the magnitude of the commission for the façade of the royal palace of La Granja in San Ildefonso for King Philip V that afforded the sculptor great respect and international notoriety.