GIOVANNI BATTISTA SALVI, CALLED SASSOFERRATO | HOLY FAMILY WITH THE INFANT SAINT JOHN THE BAPTIST

Collection of Thomas Baring (1799–1873), London, acquired from Mr Bentley in 1845;

Thence by inheritance to Thomas George Baring, 1st Earl of Northbrook (1826–1904), London;

Thence by descent to his wife Florence Anita, Countess of Northbrook (1861–1946), London;

Her sale, London, Christie’s, 11 June 1937, lot 17;

Anonymous sale, London, Christie’s, 27 July 1945, lot 128;

Anonymous sale, London Christie’s, 4 November 1960, lot 63;

Private collection, Rome;

By whom sold, Vienna, Dorotheum, 23 October 2018, lot 97;

There acquired.

J.P. Richter, A descriptive catalogue of the collection of pictures belonging to the Earl of Northbrook, London 1889, p. 158, no. 212.

Sassoferrato, named for his birthplace in the Marches, trained in Rome with Domenichino, from whom he learned classicizing and archaizing Renaissance compositional motifs. Today he is celebrated for his intimate devotional paintings, like the present, which are characterized by clear, even lighting, a balanced color scheme, and a serene mood. A preparatory drawing for this painting, of similar dimensions and squared for transfer, is conserved in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.¹

This copper belonged to the prestigious nineteenth-century collector Sir Thomas Baring, part of a prominent British banking family and a member of Parliament from 1844. According to Richter (see Literature), Baring's father and grandfather also collected European painting, and upon his death in 1873, his comprehensive collection passed to his nephew Thomas George Baring, who held political posts in India. 

1. See J. Bean, 17th century Italian drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York 1979, pp. 264-265, no. 349, fig. 1.