This portrait of a gentleman with sailing ships on the background was executed around 1830s and purchased in the private estate of Austrian noble family Galatti. Due to the family legend the sitter on portrait is to be said Michele Tomaso Galatti (born 1805 in Chios , died in Graz), the Gouverneur of Triest and Austrian Coast in 1830-1840.

Not much is known about the portrayed person. We have found that the family of Michele Tomaso Galatti (Galati), born on the Greek island of Chios, arrived in Trieste and settled there after the Ottoman massacres on Chios (1822) and in the course of the Greek Uprising (Greek War of Liberation).

Due to the very close similarities ( for comparison see our additional photos of another works by the same author) we attributed this portrait to the hand of famous Slovenian-Italian portrait painter Guiseppe Tomins /Tominz (1790 in Gorica/Gorizia - 1866 in Gradišče and Prvačino/Gradiscotta in Val Vipasso).
Some another portraits by Tominc like our work are unsigned too.
In addition to the stylistic similarity of portraits of Tominc  with our work our assumption is also based on the fact that the artist, like the depicted sitter , lived and worked in Trieste in the same time (1830-1855) and  due the artis't biography Tominc received several orders from the Archdiocese of Gorizia and the cities of Ljubljana and Trieste.  During this period he also painted portrait of the painter Giuseppe Bernardino Bison (1830), portrait of Jacob Cohen (1782-1852) grain merchant from Trieste and portrait of freight forwarder Paolo Preinitsch (Rosegg 1762-1840 Trieste). 

Literature: in on-line : www.booklooker.de ( info about Galatti) ; artist lexicons by Thieme/Becker, Comanducci, Bénézit.

Inscription: unsigned, a label with info about the sitter on the back of the stretcher.

Technique: oil on canvas, original period gilt frame.

Measurements: unframed w 26 3/4" x h 31 1/2" (68 x 80 cm); framed w 38 5/8" x h 43 1/3" (98 x 110 cm).

Condition: very good condition.