Lot 105
  • 105

Francesco Fontebasso

Estimate
5,000 - 7,000 GBP
bidding is closed

Description

  • Francesco Fontebasso
  • Recto: Head of a young girl looking over her shoulder to the rightverso: A reclining female nude
  • Black chalk (recto);
    pen and brown ink over black chalk (verso);
    Bears old attribution in brown ink: del Guardi

Provenance

Sale, Paris, Christie's, 27 November 2002, lot 95

Condition

Window mounted. On the recto a light brown stain top right, with other smaller stains around and along the right margin and at the bottom edge. On the verso very minor yellow staining of the surface not very visible. The media is strong on both recto and verso. Sold mounted and framed.
"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. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Catalogue Note

The style of the study on the recto suggests a degree of influence from Giovanni Antonio Guardi (to whom the traditional and old attribution to 'Guardi' most probably refers), but seems even more indebted to that of Fontebasso's master, Sebastiano Ricci, who made a number of very beautiful drawings of heads, sometimes in coloured chalks.  The foreshortened depiction of the female head seen here also echoes very similar heads that can be found in Sebastiano's painted oeuvre.  Fontebasso too included similar heads in his paintings; see for instance the young attendant of Bathsheba, holding a mirror, in his David and Bathsheba, in a private collection in Padua.1 

The reclining female figure on the verso of the present sheet is close to one of the nymphs to the right of centre in Fontebasso's drawing, Six Nymphs and two putti by a pool, in the Princeton University Art Museum,2 which relates to an etching that the artist executed in 1744. In 1732, very early in his career, Fontebasso had also used a similar pose of a reclining nude for the figure of Eve in his monochrome fresco representing Adam and Eve, in the sacristy of the Chapel of Villa Manin, at Passariano, near Udine.4  

1  M. Magrini, Francesco Fontebasso, Vicenza 1988, fig. 92
2  Inv. no. 46-1; F. Gibbons, Italian Drawings In the Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton 1977, vol. I, p. 80, no. 210, reproduced vol. II, fig. 210 
A. de Vesme, Le Peintre graveur italien, Milan 1906, 476, no. 5 ('Six nymphes et deux Amours dans un paysage')
4  Magrini, op. cit., pp. 166-167, reproduced fig. 4