Giuseppe Alchen Bordeaux Study

Giuseppe Arcimboldo was an Italian painter most renown for creating composite portraits-imaginative portrait heads made entirely of common objects such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, fishes, and books.These special portraits are so attractively unique that they brought him the Holy Roman Emperor’s favor and a highly admirable reputation during his era. Even from a contemporary perspective, these works are still astonishing, that attracted the attention of art historians.My research focused on the creation of Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s composite portraits. After studying the many aspects of his life, travels, and works deeply, I point out the possible factors that inspired the creation of composite portraits, visually and ideally:"The form of composition", "precise and realistic details", "multiple and complex metaphors" are the three main characters of the composite portraits. These three characters had been inspired by different factors of Arcimboldo’s life, namely "the handicraft from sixteenth century Italy", "the naturalism of Lombardy art and Leonardo da Vinci’s manuscripts", "the humanism and natural study at the Habsburg court".