- 419
Antonio Zanchi
Estimate
20,000 - 30,000 USD
Sold
bidding is closed
Description
- Antonio Zanchi
- The Death of King Josiah
- oil on canvas
- 45 1/2 by 65 1/4 in.; 115.6 by 165.7cm.
Provenance
Anonymous sale, New York, Bonhams, 26 October 2011, lot 12 (as "Neapolitan School, 17th Century");
There purchased by the present owner.
There purchased by the present owner.
Catalogue Note
According to Kings: 22-23 and Chronicles: 34-35, Josiah was the King of Judah and an institutor of major religious reforms, credited as having discovered the "book of law", sometimes identified as a portion or whole of what is now the Book of Deuteronomy. Josiah's death is described in relatively brief detail in both Kings and Chronicles. It is written in both books that he was killed by Pharoah Necho II of Egypt in battle at Megiddo, an important ancient strategic site located in modern day Israel.
This dramatic tenebrist canvas is probably a work of Zanchi's early maturity, dating from around or shortly after 1660. At this date his work betrays a keen interest in the early work of Luca Giordano and the Genoese Giovanni Battista Langetti, who had recently settled in Venice. Comparable figures may, for example, be found in his Alexander the Great and the Body of Darius painted for the Palazzo Albrizzi in Venice and still in situ.
This dramatic tenebrist canvas is probably a work of Zanchi's early maturity, dating from around or shortly after 1660. At this date his work betrays a keen interest in the early work of Luca Giordano and the Genoese Giovanni Battista Langetti, who had recently settled in Venice. Comparable figures may, for example, be found in his Alexander the Great and the Body of Darius painted for the Palazzo Albrizzi in Venice and still in situ.