Christ Blessing

Della Porta Bartolomeo called Fra Bartolomeo

(Prato 1472 - Florence 1517)

This panel may have been among the paintings purchased from Giovan Paolo della Porta in 1609, a transaction which is attested to in documents in the Borghese archives. While in the past the work was ascribed to Mariotto Albertinelli, Everett Fahy was the first critic to propose the name of Fra’ Bartolomeo (Bartolomeo della Porta), given stylistic similarities with the Annunciation painted by the artist for the cathedral of Volterra in 1497; this year in fact represents the point of reference for the date of the work in question. The half-length depiction of Christ in the act of blessing incorporates an iconographic apparatus influenced by late 15th-century northern European models.

Object details

Commentary

The painting has been identified as the ‘half-length Saviour believed to be by Rosso Fiorentino’ mentioned in Jacopo Manilli’s 17th-century guidebook to Villa Pinciana (1650, p. 97). As the work already formed part of the Borghese Collection by this date, critics have proposed that it was among the paintings purchased in 1609 by the Borghese family from Giovan Paolo della Porta, brother and heir of the sculptor and antiques dealer Tommaso. Among these works figured one by ‘Rosso di Fiorenza’, although the subject is not specified (Della Pergola 1959, pp. 9, 216).

The panel is again referred to in the 1790 inventory, which contains an entry for ‘the Saviour, by Pietro Perugino’, and again in the 1833 Inventario Fidecommissario with the same attribution.

While Piancastelli (1891, p. 288) accepted the name of Perugino, Venturi (1893, p. 200) was the first scholar to connect the work with the circle of Fra’ Bartolomeo (Bartolomeo della Porta), specifically proposing Mariotto Albertinelli as the artist. Mariotto in fact worked closely together with Fra’ Bartolomeo during their apprenticeship under Cosimo Rosselli and went on to share a workshop with him. The attribution to Albertinelli was accepted by many critics and prevailed into the second half of the 20th century.

Fahy (1969, pp. 146-147) was the first to suggest the name of Fra’ Bartolomeo himself, recognising the same hand in both the Christ Blessing and the Annunciation painted by the artist for the Volterra Cathedral in 1497. In the opinion of this scholar, the stylistic similarities between the two works not only supported a common attribution but also provided evidence that they were executed in the same period. Fahy in fact pointed to the correspondence of several details in the two paintings, such as the respective renderings of the hair of Christ and of the Virgin and the adorned edges of their garments.

At the end of the 20th century, the Borghese panel was displayed at Palazzo Pitti in Florence in an exhibition curated by Serena Padovani. On this occasion, the work was ascribed to Fra’ Bartolomeo (Padovani 1996, p. 73); indeed a restoration operation conducted in 1994 provided further support for this attribution (see also Stefani 2000, p. 289).

This half-length representation of Christ shows him with his head slightly inclined toward the viewer’s right; he gives the sign of the blessing with one hand while holding the nails of the Crucifixion in the other.

It was Fahy (1969) again who discerned the influence of late 15th-century northern European models in this iconography. He noted, for example, similar motifs in the production of Hans Memling and his followers. Specifically, both the face of Christ and the details of the landscape that stand out against the background, such as the towers on the right, show that the Tuscan artist may have drawn inspiration from northern examples for the execution of this panel (Stefani 2000).

Pier Ludovico Puddu