Physica curiosa

Physica curiosa
acrylic, oil and watercolor on canvas
15 x 20 cm
25 x 30 cm. with frame

Physica curiosa reminds a piece of the compendiums of pictures and stories regarding monsters, physical abnormalities, and bizarre animals produced during 17th Century.*
Presented with a showy golden frame in its own exhibition room, like in a Wunderkammer (Cabinet of Wonder), the painting is the last work of 314/317/318 exhibition and the first of a series dedicated to the topic:

The last image is one ironic identification profile that brings to mind the revealing and accusing guilty a natural but deformed creature, some kind of a dwarf with bloodshot eyes. He is accompanied by the legend Physica curiosa, because the tone is not apocalyptic but ironic and aloof, like the one of an entomologist and naturalist used to the freaks of nature. The most astonishing among these seems to be the man himself. [refer to post 314/317/318]
Marcello Monaldi

[ * The authors of these studies were respected and experienced physicians and natural philosophers, such as Gaspar Schott, who published Physica Curiosa in 1662]