Cosí Fan Tutte
Opera By Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Third act
Wine labels from Naples
The portraits in the artwork from right to left are:
Mozart (composer) Da Ponte (librettist) Valentino (self portrait of the artist)
This stunning work of art based upon a scene in Così Fan Tutte and is produced, in accordance with the artist’s customary technique, using only the labels taken from bottles of fine wine.
Così Fan Tutte is a comic opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Its libretto was written by Lorenzo da Ponte. Così Fan Tutte is one of three Mozart operas for which da Ponte wrote the libretto, the other two were Le Nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni.
It is commonly held that Così Fan Tutte was written and composed at the suggestion of the Emperor Joseph II however, recent research does not support this idea. Other evidence suggests that it was Mozart's contemporary Antonio Salieri, who tried to set the libretto but left it unfinished. In 1994, John Rice uncovered two terzetti by Salieri in the Austrian National Library.
Così Fan Tutte was first performed in Vienna in 1790. Its subject matter did not offend Viennese sensibilities of the time but throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries it was considered risqué and as a result, the opera was rarely performed. It regained its popularity in the operatic repertoire only after World War II.