The Librarian Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526-1593)

Description of Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s painting The Librarian

Giuseppe Arcimboldo was an artist who lived in Italy in the 16th century, a painter at the court of the Habsburgs. He was an enigmatic and peculiar artist of the time, for which he became famous. Neither the general public nor experts are still unable to fully unravel the mystery of his painting.

Today, his painting impresses with its unique artistic concept, and a bold "avant-garde" embodiment. Until our days have survived 14 of his paintings. Arcimboldo - a brilliant spokesman for nature, he very skillfully and truthfully conveyed on his paintings its colors, dying and reborn splendor.

One of his paintings, The Librarian, was painted by him in 1565. Looking at this painting, one gets the impression that the author depicted a real bookworm.

This three-dimensional composition, which embodies the image of a stereotypical librarian, which has been developed over many years.

It is a man with a beard of unclear age, he is covered with books.

The librarian seems to come out from behind a closed dark curtain to bring some books from the archives to the reader. He has been working in the library for years, fully immersed in his activities. This bookworm knows how to help readers with choosing the right book, and where which one is on which shelf.

In his hands and on his chest he holds books of different colors and sizes, they are also depicted in the form of a hand, head and torso. To some, the depicted librarian may seem like a nerdy, under-aged worker who jealously guards the book treasures.

This image was created by the author with the help of a visual pun in the form of a symbolic figure, which the artist was so successful in creating. These transformations in the 20th century were as a source of inspiration and imitation by the Surrealist painter Salvador Dali, known to all.