- 450
Giovanni di Niccolò de Lutero called Dosso Dossi
Description
- Giovanni di Niccolò de Lutero called Dosso Dossi
- A river landscape with figures on a country road, a view of a town in the distance
- oil on canvas
Provenance
Baroness Sophie von Bayrstorff (1827-1912), created Countess von Bayrstorff in 1840, wife of Paulo Martins, Visconde de Almeida (1806-1874);
By descent and inheritance to her daughter-in-law, Princess Hélène von Wrede (1859-1935);
Anonymous sale, New York, Sotheby's, 15 January 1993, lot 70, where acquired by the present owner (as Dosso Dossi).
Literature
A. Ballarin, Dosso Dossi, La pittura a Ferrara negli anni del ducato di Alfonso I, Padua 1995, vol. I, pp. 321-22, cat. no. 401, reproduced vol. II, fig. 486 (as Battista Dossi).
Condition
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."
Catalogue Note
The man riding a mule lower right is reminiscent of a similar figure group in the Walk in the Woods from 1517-18 in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Besançon.2 The coloring, the handling of paint, in particular the foliage, and the figure types also recall the Three Ages of Man, from the same years, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.3 As Professor Ballarin notes in a private communication, the present picture stands out for its background in the distance, which extends further than most of Dosso's landscapes.
We are grateful to Professor Alessandro Ballarin for confirming the attribution to Dosso on the basis of color images. When he published the picture as by Dosso's brother Battista, he only knew the work from black and white photographs.
1. "Un paese de' Dossi con un uomo vestito a nero sopra di una mula senza cornice, alto on. 20 largo on. 28."
2. See Ballarin, under Literature, vol. I, p. 311, cat. no. 369, reproduced vol. II, fig. 485;
3. Ibid., pp. 310-11, cat. no. 368, reproduced vol. II, fig. 480.