Giulio Pippi, called Giulio Romano

Giulio Romano was particularly celebrated and recognized in his time for his innovative designs and his restless imagination in creating harmonious and illusionistic interiors. This elegant drawing, representing an allegory of Abundance, incorporates many familiar elements from Giulio’s repertoire found in the decoration of both Palazzo Te and the Palazzo Ducale, Mantua. His style frequently involved appropriations of antique sources in his narrative, and as so often in Giulio’s works, the motifs in the present drawing are loosely inspired by the Antique. 

This sheet is most probably a preliminary study for a stucco roundel, as indicated by the indications of a circular shape lightly drawn around the composition. The graceful contours of the figures are characteristic of Giulio’s interest in depicting visually pleasing forms, resulting in a harmonious ensemble. This is especially evident in the beautiful figure of Abundance, seated on a stool with leonine feet, surrounded by her attendants, one kneeling and holding a large cornucopia springing out from an acanthus leaf. The drawing is executed with a typically delicate and fluid use of the pen and ink, complemented by generously applied light red wash. Some of the shadowing at the center of the composition is accented with reassured parallel lines.

Frederick Hartt dated this handsome sheet to circa 1528. It does not seem to relate to any surviving or known decoration, and may record a discarded design.

Giulio, one of the most influential of Raphael’s pupils, arrived in Mantua in 1524 when Federico Gonzaga ruled the city as the fifth marchese, a title he had assumed in 1519. In 1530 the emperor Charles V conferred on him the title of duke. The Gonzaga family had ruled the Mantuan state since the early 14^th century. In the 15^th and 16^th centuries their passion for art attracted to Mantua artists as illustrious as Mantegna and Giulio Romano, to serve the family’s growing prestige and need for visual propaganda. 

The provenance of this sheet from the renowned Ellesmere sale is extremely distinguished. It is one of several drawings by Giulio dispersed from the Richardson collection, which than passed to two other great collectors of Italian drawings, Sir Joshua Reynolds and Sir Thomas Lawrence, before entering the collection of Lord Francis Egerton, 1st Earl of Ellesmere (1800-1857), who acquired them in 1836 from the dealer Samuel Woodburn (1786-1853).