Francesco Robba

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Robba fountain in the Town Square in Ljubljana. The St. Nicholas Cathedral can be seen in the background.
Robba fountain in the Town Square in Ljubljana. The St. Nicholas Cathedral can be seen in the background.

Francesco Robba (May 1, 1698 – January 24, 1757) was an Italian sculptor of the Baroque period. He was born in Venice and died in Zagreb, Croatia, although he lived most of his life in Ljubljana (now in Slovenia). Even while he is regarded as the leading Baroque sculptor of marble statues in south-east Central Europe, he has remained practically unknown to the international scholarly public.

He received his training in the workshop of the Venetian sculptor Pietro Baratta from 1711 to 1716. In the same year, he moved to Ljubljana (then part of the Habsburg Monarchy) to work with the Slovenian master Mislej and married his daughter Theresa.

In this early period, his first marble statues and reliefs still reflect the influence of Pietro Baratta. When Mislej died in 1727, Robba took over his workshop and his clientele. Soon Robba started to earn his own reputation and was awarded prestigious commissions by ecclesiastical, aristocratic and bourgeois patrons. Already in 1729 his work was praised in a letter to Prince Emmerich Esterházy, Archbishop of Esztergom by the rector of the Jesuit College in Zagreb.

From 1730 on his works attest of a growing self-confidence. His technical virtuosity manifests itself in the emotional expressions and the refined forms of his statues.

He was recognized by the people of Ljubljana as a "honorary citizen of Ljubljana". In 1743 he was elected to the External Council of the city. In 1745 he was appointed "state engineer" of Carniola. During all this time, he didn't loose contancts with Venice, since he paid several visits to his native city. This allowed him to remain familiar with the Baroque sculpture of central Italy and Rome.

In 1755 he left Ljubljana for Zagreb, where he died on January 24, 1757.

His most famous work is Robba's fountain (1751), representing the three rivers of Carniola (Ljubljanica, Sava and Krka); in Ljubljana. He had been inspired by Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers on Piazza Navona during a visit to Rome.

Other works include the Narcissus fountain (Ljubljana), the altar and the statues (1736) in St. James's church (Ljubljana), an altar in the cathedral of Saint Nicholas (Ljubljana), an altar in the Franciscan Church of the Annunciation (Ljubljana)

The work of Francesco Robba was highlighted in an international scientific symposium, held in Ljubljana in November 1998.

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