Collector, Dealer, Connoisseur: The Vision of Richard L. Feigen

Domenico Zampieri, called Domenichino

Tobias and the Angel

Auction Closed

October 18, 03:29 PM GMT

Estimate

30,000 - 50,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Domenico Zampieri, called Domenichino

Bologna 1581 - 1641 Naples

Tobias and the Angel

oil on canvas

canvas: 12 1/4 by 19 1/8 in.; 31.1 by 48.6 cm.

framed: 20 by 26 1/2 in.; 50.8 by 67.3 cm.

The Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, Lennoxlove, Haddington, East Lothian (according to a seal on the reverse);
The Stover Collection, Edward Adolphus, the 12th Duke of Somerset (Seymour), Maiden;
His estate sale, London, Christie's, 28 June 1890, lot 60 (as A. Carracci);
Charles Butler, London;
Anonymous sale ("The Property of a Gentleman"), London, Christie's, 15 July 1893, lot 137 (as A. Carracci);
Anders E. Sola, Seattle;
Anonymous sale, London, 26 March 1969, lot 63;
With Yvonne Tan Bunzl, London;
From whom acquired by Richard L. Feigen in 1973.

R. Spear, Domenichino, New Haven and London 1982, vol. I, p. 186, cat. no. 44; vol. II, reproduced plate 157 (as by Domenichino);
J. Pope-Hennessy, "The Sensuous and the Cerebral," in Times Literary Supplement, 25 March 1983, p. 305;
A. Sutherland-Harris, Landscape Painting in Rome 1596 - 1675, exhibition catalogue, New York 1985, pp. 286-288, cat. no. 47 (as by Viola);
N. Roio, “Domenico Zampieri detto Domenichino”, in La Scuola dei Carracci, ed. by E. Negro, M. Pirondini, Bologna 1995, p. 298 (as Domenichino?);
R. Spear, Domenichino Addenda, in 'Burlington Magazine", CXXXI, January 1989, p. 15, no. 44.

Tokyo, National Museum of Western Art, Claude Lorraine and the Ideal Landscape, 15 September - 6 December 1998, no. 10 (as Domenichino).

Domenichino was the leader of early 17th-century Emilian landscape painting, which embraced the naturalism and purity of subject made popular in the region by the Carracci in the preceding years. His landscapes, of which the present type is characteristic, are in essence pure landscape compositions that at the time were new and exciting inventions that put nature and its endless variety at the center of the visual narrative. They were made popular by Domenichino as well as by a number of previously overlooked specialists in the genre.

One such specialist was Giovanni Battista Viola, who was known to have both collaborated with Domenichino and produced independent work. Viola's first master, Annibale Carracci, has also been credited with the execution of this picture in the past (see Provenance). Furthermore, Antonio Carracci, the son of Agostino and the nephew of Annibale Carracci, is a more elusive figure in this narrative, yet is the name which Sir Denis Mahon attached to the work upon studying it firsthand in 1996. Richard Spear, to whom we are grateful, maintains a full attribution to Domenichino, while John Marciari has argued for an attribution to Viola from circa 1610 on the basis of comparison with other works by Viola. Specifically, he draws comparison to two St. John the Baptist landscapes in the Pitti, a Concert on the Water and Landscape with St. Eustache, both in the Louvre.