Icilio Federico Joni

Lillian Russell Moore (1860/1861-1922), Pittsburgh;

By whose estate sold, New York, American Art Association, 12-13 February 1923;

Where acquired by Tom and Henriette Briggs (all of the above according to an inscription on the verso);

Thereafter acquired by the present owner.

Executed by the Sienese painter, gilder, restorer, and self-described "forger" Icilio Federico Joni, this work is a testament to the surge in popularity of Italian Renaissance panel painting around the turn of the twentieth century, when demand outpaced supply, prompting skilled artists to recreate Renaissance-inspired works.¹ Indeed, Joni repeated this type of composition, featuring a single military male saint, on several occasions, even replicating the star-adorned frame. Here Joni depicts San Galgano holding the sword he is said to have planted in a rock while taking his monastic vows; the blade remains embedded in the stone at the monastery named after the saint at Monte Siepi, near Volterra.

In the early twentieth century, the present work was owned by Lillian Russell, the world-renowned stage actress and singer. Celebrated as much for her colorful personal life, as for her beauty and talent, she was her generation's "feminine ideal incarnate."

¹ See Joni's memoir, Le memorie di un pittore di quadri antichi, con alcune descrizioni sulla pittura a tempera a sul modo di fare invecchiare i dipinti e le dorature, Florence 1984.