- 219
Francesco Fontebasso Venice 1707 - 1769
Description
- Francesco Fontebasso
- Adoration of the Shepherds
- oil on canvas
Provenance
His sale, Berlin, Ball and Graupe, April 24, 1931, lot 11 (as Ricci);
Lore and Rudolf Heinemann;
Their deceased sale, London, Christie's, July 7, 2000, lot 80 (as Ricci).
Literature
M. Levey, The Later Italian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, London 1964, p. 100, under no. 646 (as Ricci);
J. Daniels, Sebastiano Ricci, Hove 1976, p. 68, no. 213 (as Ricci);
J. Daniels, L'Opera Completa di Sebastiano Ricci, Milan 1976, p. 102 no. 172 (as Ricci);
A. Rizzi, in Sebastiano Ricci, exhibition catalogue, Villa Manin di Passariano 1989, p. 162, under cat. no. 53.
Catalogue Note
We are grateful to Lino Moretti who, based on images, has identified our painting as by Fontebasso.
This painting relates in composition, with differences, to a modello of the same subject by Sebastiano Ricci at Hampton Court, now dated to circa 1723-24 and to an altarpiece in the cathedral of Saluzzo, Piedmont (see J. Daniels, Sebastiano Ricci, London 1976, cat. nos. 152 and 402 respectively).
Fontebasso was a student of Ricci's and may have copied the Saluzzo picture while he was in the Master's studio. Fontebasso made copies after at least two other compositions by Ricci: a Last Supper in the Accademia, Venice and a Madonna with Saints Gregory and Vitalis in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.