A postcard photograph of the elder Verdi, shown in a brimmed hat and overcoat, and which he has signed and dated at the bottom. Nicely presented in a muted silver-tone frame with textured beige mat.

After the enormously successful premiere of Falstaff in 1893, Verdi kept to smaller musical projects and philanthropic ventures throughout his remaining years. He wrote a song to benefit earthquake victims in Sicily, helped to plan, build, and endow a retirement home for musicians in Milan, and contributed to the founding of a new hospital in Emilia-Romagna. The year he signed this photograph saw the appearance of his last major work, a set of four choral settings entitled Quattro pezzi sacri. Although Verdi had composed these settings at different times, he chose to publish them together and they are often performed as a cycle.