Madonna and Blessing Child
Traditionally attributed to Agostino Carracci, this panel is now ascribed to an anonymous Tuscan painter strongly influenced by the grace and formal strategies cherished by Perugino and Raphael. It depicts the Virgin and the Christ Child portrayed against the recess of an architectural structure, which by hiding the background places them close to the observer.
Object details
Inventory
Location
Date
First half of 16th century
Classification
Period
Medium
Dimensions
Frame
Salvator Rosa, 77 x 59 x 7 cm
Provenance
Rome, Borghese Collection, 1693 (Inv. 1693, room II, no. 54; Della Pergola 1959); Inventario Fidecommissario Borghese 1833, p. 32. Purchased by Italian state, 1902.
Conservation and Diagnostic
Commentary
The provenance of this painting is still unknown. It was first mentioned in connection with the Borghese Collection in the late 17th century, when it seems to correspond to the entry of the 1693 inventory that reads, ‘A work of roughly three spans with a Madonna with the blessing Child on her lap, on panel, no. 427, with a smooth, gilded, engraved frame. Artist uncertain’ (Inv. 1693; Della Pergola 1959).
Inexplicably ascribed to Agostino Carracci both in the 1833 Inventario Fidecommissario and by Giovanni Piancastelli (1891), the work was first associated with the Florentine school by Adolfo Venturi (1893). For his part, Roberto Longhi (1928) attributed the panel to Girolamo del Pacchia. Paola della Pergola (1959), however, rejected both these proposals, suggesting rather an anonymous ‘Tuscan master’ of the first half of the 16th century. As this scholar noted, the rather modest quality of the composition makes it difficult to identify the artist. Nonetheless, it is certain that the painter in question was influenced by the contemporary production of imitators of Raphael.
Antonio Iommelli
Bibliography
- G. Piancastelli, Catalogo dei quadri della Galleria Borghese, in Archivio Galleria Borghese, 1891, p. 182;
- A. Venturi, Il Museo e la Galleria Borghese, Roma 1893, p. 181;
- R. Longhi, Precisioni nelle Gallerie Italiane, I, La R. Galleria Borghese, Roma 1928, p. 213;
- P. della Pergola, La Galleria Borghese. I Dipinti, II, Roma 1959, p. 38;
- K. Herrmann Fiore, Galleria Borghese Roma scopre un tesoro. Dalla pinacoteca ai depositi un museo che non ha più segreti, San Giuliano Milanese 2006, p. 123.
