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Provenance Research on the Paintings at Strossmayer Gallery — Selected Examples from the Collection of Italian Painting
Ljerka Dulibić
; Strossmayerova galerija starih majstora Hrvatske akademije znanosti i umjetnosti
Sažetak
After explaining the terminology (provenance, complete provenance, original provenance), and a survey of sources, the author discusses select examples from the collection of Italian painting in the Strossmayer gallery in Zagreb. The selection was based on a variety of sources used in the research, and on subsequent conclusions.
The discussion of the acquisition circumstances of Fra Angelico's Stigmatization of St. Francis of Assisi and the Death of St. Peter Martyr emphasizes the importance of the total documentation available. The data from the two hand-written catalogues, which have been regularly taken over by later printed catalogues, should always be widened by consulting Strossmayer's correspondence preserved within the Bishop's legacy in the Archives of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Some other examples show how the sparse data may be complemented through a careful analysis of the documentation and catalogues, leading to insights about the conditions of acquisitions and about former owners. In that way the author has established that some paintings in the Gallery came from the collection of Johann Anton Ramboux. One should note the possibility of Strossmayer's repeated cooperation with J. M. Heberle of the Lamperz firm, with the help of which the paintings from the Ramboux collection were acquired.
On a basis of a careful study of the documentation, the author has been able to identify one more painting in the Strossmayer donation which came from the Cardinal Fesch collection. The former joint context of that group is especially significant because of different ways the paintings entered the Gallery (Strossmayer donation of 1885, purchase in 1966), i.e., various points of provenance in terms of their former place in the Fesch collection, and the current one in the collection of the Strossmayer Gallery.
The author has also listed an example of presumed provenance of the painting St. George Killing the Dragon by Cesare Cavalier d'Arpino, the provenance of which remains obscure due to the fact that there are several paintings on the theme within the artist's oeuvre.
Although the existence of several paintings on the same theme often prevents a definite linking of art works and the corresponding documentation data, in some cases the professional and scholarly authorities are so unanimous that some of the assumptions tend to become assertions. Such is the case of Mariotto Albertinelli's painting Expulsion of Adam and Eve, the historiography of which has been thoroughly reconstructed in this research. By checking with a more comprehensive bibliography, in the Gallery unknown data on the provenance of the painting have been discovered. Now we know more about former owner (or owners) — the painting had been acquired by the Roman merchant, Bassegio, from William Buchanan in London in 1835 but we also know its origin: the painting has been identified as the one mentioned in Vasari's biography of Albertinelli, as one of the three "storiette", the artist had painted for the Florentine banker, Benintendi.
The importance of prints as sources of establishing provenance has been revealed by the well known engraving of the interior of the Pommersfelden Gallery containing paintings by Federico Benkovich, and authenticating Benkovich's painting of the Sacrifice of Isaac in the Strossmayer Gallery.
Finally, the author has presented research based on the label pasted on the back of the painting of The Virgin with the Child and SS. Francis and Jerome by Biagio O'Antonio da Firenze, the provenance of which could not be established by using the documentation alone. Although the label was noticed and commented upon by the authors of all the Gallery's catalogues, nobody, not even the author of the newest monograph on the artist, the Italian scholar Roberta Bartoli (1999), did pay any attention to it. From literature it has been possible to establish the existence of another almost identical label, and further research confirmed its authenticity (labels on the paintings from the Strossmayer Gallery are no rarity, but they are difficult to authenticate). The label is a proof of the painting having formerly belonged to the Tacoli-Canacci Collection, which was duly confirmed by Vincenzo Buonocore, an art historian specializing in that collection. Although Buonocore has been unable to find a description completely corresponding to the Zagreb picture in the catalogues of the collection, he has pointed out a number of catalogue entries which may refer to our painting.
This study raises the issue of a need to systematically study the provenance of the works in the Strossmayer Gallery, not only because provenance research is a legal obligation in many countries, but also as it is one of the basic tasks of an art historian.
Ključne riječi
Italian Painting; Strossmayer Gallery of Old Masters HAZU; provenance research; J.J.Strossmayer; Johan Anton Ramboux; Joseph Fesch; Alfonso Tacoli-Canacci; Giovanmaria di Lorenzo Benintendi
Hrčak ID:
148729
URI
Datum izdavanja:
15.12.2005.
Posjeta: 1.374 *