The Saltimbanco

The saltimbanco — the travelling acrobat, juggler, or showman of the Italian street tradition — was a figure that bridged entertainment, poverty, and a certain melancholy freedom. Mancini painted saltimbanchi and circus figures throughout the 1870s, drawn both to the visual drama of their costumes and performances and to the social marginality of their existence. 'The Saltimbanco,' completed in 1879 and now at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, belongs to the same thematic family as his Neapolitan street children but introduces the adult performer whose life is defined by public display. Mancini's treatment avoids the picturesque sentimentality that lesser painters brought to such subjects: his saltimbanco is a working person in a precarious occupation, studied with the same unflinching observation he brought to impoverished children. The Philadelphia Museum's holding of this work reflects the strong American interest in Mancini's paintings — several major American collections acquired his works in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through dealers active in both Italy and the United States.

Mancini's handling of theatrical costume — the bright, often tattered fabrics of the saltimbanco's performance dress — challenged him to render both the visual brilliance of the costume and the worn reality beneath it. His impasto technique is particularly effective here: thick paint builds the highlights of shiny or stiff costume fabric while thinner passages in shadow preserve the sense of material weight. The performer's body language and the contrast between costume brightness and face gravity carry the subject's emotional complexity.