Luca Cambiaso

Sale, Bern, Galerie Kornfeld, 22-24 June 1983, lot 37;
with Colnaghi, London;
bears unidentified collector's mark, verso (not in Lugt)

Gainesville, et al, 1991-93, cat. no. 11

There is some slight abrasion along the left margin of the sheet, and what appears to be a very small hole in the lower left quarter (below the horse), although this is repaired on the verso. There is some very slight staining at the left edge, and a couple of small and isolated fox marks. Otherwise the condition is very good, and the ink is still strong and fresh.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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This scene is one of several representations by Cambiaso of Christ on Calvary, surrounded by soldiers, in preparation for the raising of the cross.  Here, we see Christ being seized by two soldiers, who violently begin to strip him of His clothes.  In this, the present drawing is comparable to another, with Colnaghi's, London in 1985 (cat. no. 6), where Christ and His tormentors take centre stage. 

The majority of Cambiaso's depictions of this subject show Christ either straddling the cross as it is readied for Him, or lying upon it.  The earliest of these studies is in the Uffizi,¹ a drawing which, in its monumental scale and elaborately wrought design, is typical of the artist's work of the 1560s.  The present drawing is, however, closer in style to Cambiaso's drawings of the 1580s, such as the examples in the Suida-Manning Collection, at the Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas (fig. 1), and in the National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh.²  In each drawing we see the same generalized figural characterisation and a reduction of the drawn line so that each form is completely unadorned.  The effect, however, is not a lack of emotional power: instead, the facelessness of Christ's tormentors increases the brutality of the scene and creates a stark vision of Jesus' last hours.

1. B. Suida Manning and W. Suida, Luca Cambiaso, la vita e le opera, Milan 1958, p. 187, fig. 390

2. J. Bober (ed.), Luca Cambiaso 1527-1585, exhibition catalogue, Austin and Genoa 2007, cat. nos. 103a, 103b