Jacopo Ligozzi

Bardi collection, Rome, before 1946 (almost certainly Pietro Maria Bardi, who moved that year to Brazil);
Private collection, Sao Paulo, Brazil;
Thence by descent until anonymously sold, New York, Sotheby's, 11 January 1990, lot 71;
Where acquired by A. Alfred Taubman.

Detroit Institute of Arts, 1990-2015 (on loan);
The Art Institute of Chicago & Detroit Institute of Arts, The Medici, Michelangelo, and The Art of Late Renaissance Florence, November 9, 2002 - June 8, 2003, no. 25.

Enciclopedia della Pittura Italiana, 1951, pp. 1349-1351, reproduced p. 1351; 
M. Bacci, "Jacopo Ligozzi e la sua posizione nella pittura Fiorentina," Proporzioni, vol. IV, 1963, p. 71;
The Medici, Michelangelo and The Art of Late Renaissance Florence, L'ombra del genio: Michelangelo e l'arte a Firenze, 1537-1631, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2002, cat. no. 25, p. 160, reproduced in color p. 161;
S. Bellesi, Catalogo dei pittori fiorentini del '600 e '700, Florence 2009, vol. I, p. 178, reproduced vol. III, p. 41, fig. 898.

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This work has been fairly recently restored, perhaps in the last 30 years. The bulk of the restoration seems to be in the white pillars on the far right. Some weakness has developed here which has required fairly numerous retouches. However, this seems to be peculiar to this one color. The remainder of the picture aside from the sky and other marble monuments has only a very few isolated and small retouches, indicating no particular condition issue at all. The retouches that have been applied are workman like and good. While the restoration to the columns could be slightly less mechanical and perhaps more attractive, the painting is certainly otherwise in lovely condition. The canvas has a respectable lining. Although the cracking is very slightly raised, adjustment to the lining is not recommended.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

This remarkable work was painted in 1596 by Jacopo Ligozzi who, despite originating from Verona, spent most of his life at the service of the court of the Medici Grandukes in Florence. His talents were extraordinary and his production included scientific and botanical drawings, designs to be rendered in pietradura, frescoes, miniatures, and both allegorical and religious paintings. The present work stands out from his corpus as it depicts the abduction of the Sabine women, and is thus possibly Ligozzi's only treatment of a classical history subject.

While Ligozzi's religious altarpieces can at times appear a little austere and, to a modern audience, too adherent to the ethos of the Counter-Reformation, his small-scale works, particularly those on copper or those depicting macabre or vanitas subjects, display a remarkable modernity. In all his works, however, what stands out is a concern for detail, which is probably due to the artist's miniaturist training. It is particularly in evidence in the present work in the gold embroidery of the red garments in the central figure, as well as in the tail of the horse at left.

Ligozzi was clearly responsive to the artistic influences around him. Throughout his career, the artist reveals a debt to Paolo Veronese's art in his treatment of large-scale paintings, as can be seen in the present work. From the two historical works from 1591 in Florence's Palazzo Vecchio, which were his first public commissions, the Coronation of Cosimo I and Pope Boniface receiving the Florentine Ambassadors, to his late work from 1623 in the cathedral of Livorno, the Apotheosis of Saint Giulia, the echoes of Veronese's classical settings, architecture and mise-en-scène can be detected. Moreover, in the figures there is also a clear reference to Giambologna's bronze bas-relief of the same subject in the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence.

The ancient historians Livy and Plutarch famously recounted the Roman abduction of the Sabine women. In the first book of his colossal history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita, Livy wrote that the Romans, not long after Romulus had founded the city, risked dying out within a single generation due to a dearth of fertile women. Desperate for a solution to this potential population crisis, Romulus sent envoys to the neighboring tribes, including the Oscan-speaking Sabines, to request intermarriage with their daughters. The Romans, however, were spurned at every turn. Upon hearing the news Romulus concealed his injured pride and organized a spectacle to honor the god Neptune, to which he invited the neighboring communities. Once the festivities commenced, Romulus gave an agreed-upon signal and the Roman men began running off with the Sabine maidens, in a gross violation of ancient laws of hospitality. The Sabines later declared war on the Romans, but their daughters, by that point married contentedly to Roman men, famously lunged themselves into the midst of the fighting and beseeched their husbands and fathers to lay down their arms. This intervention represents a dramatic reversal in the role of the Sabine women; through marriage, Livy implied, the powerless Sabine maidens transformed themselves into active agents of peace between the two peoples.