Gaetano Gandolfi San Matteo della Decima near Bologna 1734 - 1802 Bologna

Estimate

80,000 - 120,000 USD

bidding is closed

Description

Gaetano Gandolfi
portrait of mauro as a child holding a basket
bears monogram and date in black chalk on the verso: G.G f 1801
black chalk and stumping, heightened with white and red chalk on beige paper

Provenance

Private collection, USA

Exhibited

London, Colnaghi, Old Master Drawings, 28 June -21 July 1984, no.42, reproduced;
Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, Bella Pittura, The Art of the Gandolfi, 1993, no. 97, reproduced (catalogue by Mimi Cazort)

Literature

Prisco Bagni, I Gandolfi, affreschi dipinti bozzetti disegni, Padua 1992, p. 35, no. 31, reproduced

Catalogue Note

When it was included in the Ottawa exhibition, Mimi Cazort identified this handsome trois crayons drawing as a portrait of Gaetano's eldest son, Mauro, on the basis of comparison with a drawing of the same child, kneeling and leaning on a chair, which had been identified by Zanotti (Gozzadini Collection, now Archiginnasio, Bologna; see A. Zanotti, ed., Brevi cenni della vita di Mauro Gandolfi..., Comune di Bologna 1925, II:2, p. 73). The drawing would, therefore, be dated circa 1766 when Mauro was around two years old.

Other chalk studies by Gaetano of children, often his own, are known. Like this one, they are captivating works in an almost French manner. They also have an affinity with Piazzetta's studies of children, which Gaetano may have seen during his year in Venice in 1760, and indeed they have sometimes been misattributed to Piazzetta (see Bagni, op. cit., nos. 24-38). Gaetano's striking oil portrait of Mauro at the age of four (fig.1), painted in 1768, is in a private collection (see Exhibited, Ottawa, op.cit, no. 38, reproduced).