Stefano della Bella
Young Cavalier Wearing a Plumed Hat
Estimate
15,000 - 25,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Stefano della Bella
(Florence 1610 – 1664)
Young Cavalier Wearing a Plumed Hat
Pen and brown ink and purple and pink wash, over traces of black chalk;
bears label on mount with old attribution, verso: Stephano della Bella I.
144 by 123 mm; 5⅝ by 4⅞ in.
Edward Croft-Murray (1907-1980), London,
thence by descent;
with Smithson and Williams, London, Old Master Drawings. Recent Acquisitions, 1989;
with Hazlitt, Gooden and Fox Ltd., London;
with Thomas Williams Fine Art Ltd., London;
Private collection;
sale, New York, Sotheby's, 12 January 1994, lot 173;
with Thomas Williams Fine Art Ltd., London;
Charles Ryskamp (1928-2010), New York;
with Thomas Williams Fine Art Ltd., London,
where acquired by Diane A. Nixon
New York, The Pierpont Morgan Library, The World Observed: Five Centuries of Drawings from the Collection of Charles Ryskamp, 2001, no. 11 (entry by William Griswold)
Though della Bella was a prolific draftsman and many of his drawings survive, it is rare, particularly on the art market, to see a sheet of such an elaborate nature as the present work. The plumed hat, lavishly embellished with purple and pink wash, is highly reminiscent of those worn in two bust length studies of cavaliers in the collection of the City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth,1 and all three drawings were probably made in connection with the various pageants, masquerades and festivals of the Medici court.
Besides its evident aesthetic qualities this particular drawing held a special, deeply personal place in Diane Nixon’s collection. Prior to her acquisition of the sheet this drawing had belonged to Charles Ryskamp2 (see Provenance) a hugely influential figure, both as a museum director, first of the Morgan Library and then of the Frick Collection, but also as a taste maker and passionate collector of drawings. It was, in part, Ryskamp’s enthusiasm and encouragement that spurred on Diane as a collector of drawings, giving this beautiful example of della Bella’s draftsmanship a particularly powerful resonance within the broader context of her collection.
1.See An Exhibition of Old Master and English Drawings and European Bronzes from the Collection of Charles Rogers (1711-1784) and the William Cotton Bequest on loan from the City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth, exhib. cat., London, Sotheby’s, 1979, nos. 46-47, reproduced
2.For more information on Charles Ryskamp as a collector see exhib. cat., op. cit., New York 2001
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