Portrait of Vittorio Alfieri

Fabre started this portrait in July 1793, soon after the poet Vittorio Alfieri moved from Rome to Florence and settled into the city's literary circles. Alfieri sat for it in antique robes, a deliberate nod to the classical world he was steeped in. He was deep in the Greek tragedians at the time and wanted to be seen as a poet in that ancient line. On his left hand is a ring set with a carnelian that the gem-engraver Giovanni Antonio Santarelli carved with the head of Dante, tying him to the founder of Italian verse. On the back of the canvas Alfieri wrote a sonnet describing his own looks, red hair, a tall thin frame, blue eyes, and his difficult temper. The painting reached the Uffizi in 1824, alongside the portrait of the woman the poet lived with.