Oil on canvas Expert report by Professor Claudio Strinati.Annunciation(oil on canvas, cm. 101 x 69 with frame)This is a work that, for its style (the lively and animated composition of the figures and draperies) and iconography (the Archangel Gabriel and the Virgin are both standing and of equal height and presence in space), must be dated to the beginning of the eighteenth century, reflecting in part the pictorial culture of the Roman school of Carlo Maratta, probably still alive at the time of the creation of our painting here under examination; in part the legacy of the Florentine Baroque school, less known today but extremely flourishing and full of personality especially after the passage of Pietro da Cortona and Ciro Ferri in the city who left us notable masterpieces whose echo is also perceptible in our painting.For reasons of style I believe that the author of the beautiful painting here under examination should be identified with the Florentine Francesco Conti who, from a very young age, was in close contact with the Maratte school in Rome (where he was a pupil of the eminent Giovanni Maria Morandi) but who then followed his own path which led him, having returned to Florence in time, to achieve brilliant results in the field of Tuscan Baroque painting characterised by those characteristics of wit, formal elegance, graceful dynamism, which I believe can all be found in our work.A comparison with one of Conti's early masterpieces, the altarpiece of the Trinity in the Florentine church of San Jacopo sopr' Arno, datable to the end of the first decade of the eighteenth century, leads me to recognize the same hand in our painting. Moreover, it is curious how the model of the Eternal Father, with a singular baldness and a sparse and nervous beard, seems to be exactly the same both in the altarpiece mentioned and in our painting where he is canonically depicted while sending on theearth the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove.I conclude that our painting is an interesting and very beautiful testimony of thethe beginnings of an artist who is certainly less celebrated today than his other eminent fellow countrymenand contemporaries, but of considerable interest and as such cited with merit both in the writings ofold art historians, as well as those of some masters of twentieth-century historiographylike Matteo Marangoni who in his important essay Settecentisti (but nottoo) Florentines, in his volume Baroque Art, Florence Vallecchi 1973 (II ed.) putthe relevance of Conti is clearly highlighted with arguments that are still very validOur work, therefore, is of remarkable historical significance and of fine artistic quality, guaranteed moreover by an excellent state of conservation.I therefore believe that the value of the painting under examination here is set, based on the current conditions of the national market as of this appraisal, at 25,000 euros.Sincerely, Claudio Strinati 88x55 cm in a 101.5x69 cm frame Oil on canvas Francesco Conti