Benvenuto Tisi, called il Garofalo

Sir William Forbes, 7th Baronet of Pitsligo (1773–1828);

His posthumous sale, London, Rainy, 2 June 1842, lot 3;

St Benet's Hall, Oxford, and thereafter at Ampleforth Abbey,  Ampleforth.

F. Russell, 'A Holy Family by Garofalo', in The Burlington Magazine, CXIV, 826, January 1972, pp. 31–32, reproduced fig. 21;

A.M. Fioravanti Baraldi, Il Garofalo, Rimini 1993, p. 130, no. 59, reproduced.

Unrecorded until its publication in 1972, the composition of this Holy Family was known from an old copy at the Galleria Borghese, Rome, which had previously been identified as an autograph work by Bernard Berenson and Paola Della Pergola (with some reservation).¹ The subsequent appearance of this work however confirmed the Borghese painting's status as a copy. 

Garofalo places his figures close to the picture plane within a verdant setting that opens towards a luminous and atmospheric landscape. Possibly intended for private devotion, this picture is a representative example of the compositional type known as the sacra conversazione (literally ‘holy conversation’) showing the Virgin and Child with Saint Joseph engaged in a tender exchange.

¹ Fioravanti Baraldi 1993, p. 130, no. 58, reproduced; https://www.collezionegalleriaborghese.it/en/opere/holy-family-6