Lot 43

The Master of the Scandicci Lamentation, Active in Tuscany at the beginning of the 16th Century

bidding is closed

Description

The Madonna and Child seated beneath a green draped curtain
oil on poplar panel

Provenance

Edward Solly (1776-1844), London, believed to have been bought after 1821, the year of the sale of his first collection to the King of Prussia;
Probably thence by inheritance to his only daughter, Sarah Solly;
Given by one of Edward Solly's descendants to an ancestor of the present owner in Berlin.

Literature

Descriptive Catalogue of the Collection of Italian Pictures of the Rafaelle Period of the late Edward Solly, Esq., (undated) London, p. 16, no. XXVII (as Raphael: "The Madonna and Child. In the style and evidently painted at the same time as the Madonna del Baldachino. The present picture is believed to be the small one mentioned by Vasari as painted by Rafaello whilst engaged on the larger work");
P. Giusti & P.L. de Castris, Pittura del Cinquecento a Napoli. 1510-1540 forastieri e regnicoli, Naples 1988, pp. 36, 54, footnote 8, reproduced p. 38, fig. 30 (as Pedro Machuca?, formerly attributed to a follower of Raphael or specifically to Giovan Francesco Penni).

Catalogue Note

The artist's eponymous work is his copy after Perugino's Lamentation (Galleria Palatina, Palazzo Pitti, Florence) in the Church of San Bartolo in Tuto, Scandicci (near Florence). Little is known about the painter's activity though it is likely that he began his training under Perugino (given the existence of the aforementioned copy) and, since the style of his other known works are closer to that of the pupils of Domenico Ghirlandaio, and in particular to Ridolfo Ghirlandaio, it is likely that he later moved to Florence to work in his circle. The smooth handling and Raphaelesque overtones in this picture are particularly close to those in the Master's panel of The Madonna and Child with the Infant St. John the Baptist sold at Sotheby's, London, 9 December 1981, lot 24. For a comprehensive list of the artist's oeuvre see E. Fahy, Some Followers of Domenico Ghirlandaio, New York/London 1976, pp. 196-197.

The painting once belonged to the great English collector Edward Solly (1776-1844). Solly moved to Berlin in 1813, married the daughter of Auguste Krüger there three years later, and in November 1821 sold his entire collection to King Frederick William III of Prussia. He returned shortly afterwards to London, where he lived in an elegant house in Curzon Street in Mayfair, and was visited by Schinkel in 1826 and by Waagen in 1835. Gustav Waagen, who was a great admirer of Solly's, praised his taste for collecting Renaissance paintings in a letter dated 10 July 1838: "Mr. Solly is one of those rare characters who have attained the complete conviction that the works of the historical painters of the time of Raphael are at a height of perfection with which no others can bear a comparison" (G.F. Waagen, Works of Art and Artists in England, London 1838, vol. II, p. 186). The painting once formed part of Solly's collection where it was, understandably though rather optimistically, attributed to Raphael, by whom it was thought to be throughout most of its present family ownership. Though included in the posthumous catalogue of paintings in Edward Solly's collection (see Literature), the painting was not amongst those in Solly's deceased sale (London, Christie's, 18 May 1847) and may therefore have been inherited by his daughter, Miss Sarah Solly, a hypothesis lent support by family tradition that the painting was received as a gift by a forebear of the present owner from one of Solly's descendants.

The attribution to the Master of the Scandicci Lamentation has been endorsed on the basis of photographs by Everett Fahy, to whom we are grateful.