Draghi government, the first official photo is in front of a tapestry depicting ... a scam!

Rather unfortunate choice for the first official photograph of Mario Draghi’s newborn government. The new prime minister and the team of ministers posed in front of one of the splendid tapestries in the Salone dei Corazzieri at the Quirinale: it is one of the tapestries that are part of the series of the Stories of Don Quixote, woven in Paris between 1721-1722 and 1735 by the Gobelins manufactory, on cartoons by Charles-Antoine Coypel (Paris, 1694 - 1752) and prototype of the series, also dedicated to the stories of Miguel de Cervantes’ hero, that was woven in the royal manufactory in Naples between 1757 and 1779.

Charles Coypel, Don Quixote consults the enchanted bust in the palace of Don Antonio Moreno, cartoon for the tapestry of the Don Quixote series (1732; oil on canvas, 158 x 185 cm; Paris, Palais Impérial de Compiègne, on long-term loan from the Louvre)

The story told in the tapestry before which the Draghi government posed is that of the “enchanted bust.” In Chapter LXII, the protagonist of Cervantes’ novel is invited, along with the trusty squire Sancho Panza, to a ball at the palace of the nobleman Antonio Moreno, who makes fun of the knight: in fact, the nobleman takes him to a drawing room at the center of which is set a table covered with a long tablecloth, above which is a bust. Moreno tells Don Quixote that he can ask the statue anything, and it will answer. Moreno thus invites the protagonist to put a question to the statue, and don Quixote begins to speak to the bust, being astonished because it actually speaks: in reality it is a hoax hatched against the poor protagonist, because it is a relative of don Moreno’s, well hidden, who is making the statue speak.

The singular coincidence was noted by art historian Fabrizio Federici who, on his Facebook page Mo(n)stre, comments ironically, “the protagonists of the novel take the bait, but it is of course a hoax: don Antonio’s nephew speaks through the sculpture, hollow inside. In short, the new government has chosen as the background of its first official image the depiction of a scam.” In short, not exactly the best viaticum for the formation of Mario Draghi.... !

Draghi government, the first official photo is in front of a tapestry depicting ... a scam!

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