Alessandro Vitali

(Urbino 1580-1650)

After Federico Barocci

The Crucifixion with Saints Sebastian, John the Evangelist and the Virgin Mary including the addition

Footnotes

Provenance
William, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, and thence by descent to the present owner


This unpublished and lavishly refined grisaille oil on paper is a faithful replica of the Christ on the Cross with Saints Sebastian, John the Evangelist and the Virgin Mary in Genoa Cathedral, a large altarpiece executed between 1587 and 1596 by the Urbino painter Federico Barocci (circa 1533-1612). The altarpiece (fig. 1) was commissioned by the future Doge of Genoa, Matteo Senarega, for his family chapel and cost the enormous sum of 1,000 scudi, twice the sum paid around the same time to Annibale Carracci for the entire Farnese Gallery ¹. The monumental scale and importance of the enterprise was publicly praised by Senarega in an official letter addressed to Barocci on October 5, 1596, where he stated that 'The panel has only one defect, which because it has the Divine, human praises do not reach it: for this reason, it lives wrapped up between silence and marvel' ².

The precocious fame of the Genoa altarpiece and the efforts poured into it induced Barocci to reuse the composition, a practice made easy by the fact that he used to keep the 1:1 preparatory cartoons of his paintings in his workshop, ready to be proportionally enlarged, reduced, and replicated ³. The presence of the now-lost Crucifixion cartoon in Barocci's workshop in Urbino is attested by a slightly later commission which the artist took over from the local Oratorio della Confraternita della Morte together with his best pupil and associate, Alessandro Vitali (1580-1630), in 1597. Due to the time constraints of the fraternity and its shortage of money, it was agreed that the main figures of the new altarpiece were to be copied from the Genoa prototype. Working after the cartoon, Vitali executed most of the painting, while Barocci retouched the main characters, giving life in only two years (January 1597-April 1600) to a successful spin-off of his previous achievement which was even publicly praised in the painter's funeral oration (1612) ⁴. The 1:1 autograph replica in oil on paper which was on the art market in the late 1980s and is today in the Kunstmuseen Skt Gallen, Switzerland must date from around the same time. Traditionally interpreted as a preliminary sketch for the final composition, this refined painting on paper shows no sign of pentimenti and is finished in all its parts, suggesting that it was conceived as an autonomous work of art intended for private collectors and amateurs.

The case of the Skt Gallen 'sketch' is not isolated. During his life, Barocci executed many works in oil on paper, both studies for entire compositions and individual 'teste di carattere' ⁵. If some of these works, such as the beautiful study for the Last Supper in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge ⁶, or the small bozzetto for the Entombment in the Getty Museum, Los Angeles ⁷, are clearly part of the preparatory process, showing signs of pentimenti, corrections and areas intentionally left blank, others are fully-finished creations, made in order to fulfil the requests of the market and capitalise the artist's creative efforts ⁸. This category includes both finished head studies (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art ⁹; Stockholm, Nationalmuseum ¹⁰; Salzburg, Residenz), autograph coloured reduced replicas of entire compositions ¹¹, and small-size, grisaille replicas, such as the Madonna of the Rosary in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, connected to a painting executed by Barocci in Senigallia between circa 1589 and 1595 (fig. 2).¹² Whether this beautiful and perfectly refined object was executed by Barocci before or after the completion of the altarpiece is a matter of debate. What is more interesting, however, is that the master executed at least one other autograph version of it (private collection, unpublished), and that both these autograph prototypes were copied again and again by his workshop (France, private collection; Paris, art market, formerly with the Galerie Tarantino; Milan, Museo Poldi Pezzoli, from the Riccardo Lampugnani Collection). Other grisaille replicas of whole or partial compositions, traditionally assigned by Barocci but now recognisable as products of the workshop on the grounds of quality, are in Windsor (Flight of Aeneas from Troy, Royal Collection; ¹³. another version was recently on the British art market) ¹⁴, Washington (The Presentation of the Virgin, National Gallery of Art, from the Woodner collection (fig. 3) ¹⁵, Stamford (The Annunciation, Burghley House) ¹⁶, and Urbino (A cat, Galleria Nazionale delle Marche). ¹⁷

The Crucifixion discussed here belongs to the same category of grisaille workshop replicas of Barocci's more successful compositions, probably as one of the best examples of the group. Its exceptional quality and the metallic coldness of the palette suggest its author is the same person who executed the Washington Presentation. The comparison with the acknowledged work of Barocci's best pupils both the grisailles to be assigned to Alessandro Vitali, mentioned above as the collaborator of the Compagnia della Morte altarpiece made in 1597-1600 after the Genoa composition ¹⁸. Vitali's two altarpieces of Saint Catherine in jail and of the Annunciation, both in the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, Urbino, derived from Barocci's prototypes between 1598 and 1603, show an identical metallic, glazed treatment of the surfaces, as well as an emphasized liveliness and roundness of the cheeks and of the facial types.

The close connection between Barocci and Vitali, and the latter's success in quickly establishing an independent career both as a copyist of his master's models and as an independent painter, explain the introduction of minor variations in our Crucifixion: a flock of birds flying around the towers of the ducal palace, and some new buildings on the square. They show Vitali's passion for details and might be connected to the nordicizing Flemish taste of the Urbino court around 1600.

The result of such a combination of local tradition and external influences is an exceptionally refined work of art, whose precious and jewel-like quality, similar to the contemporary illuminations by Cesare Franchi or Gherardo Cibo, is enhanced by the use of a paper support and by the adoption of Barocci's elegant grayish-orange palette.


This note anticipates some of the results which will be published in the forthcoming essay by Luca Baroni, The role and influence of Federico Barocci's oil 'sketches' on paper. We thank Luca Baroni, Ph.D., for preparing this catalogue note.

Note on the provenance
William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth (1731-1801) studied at Trinity College, Oxford before embarking on the grand tour travelling to Italy via France with his stepbrother Frederick, Lord North, and their tutor Christopher Golding. They are recorded as being in Italy from 1752-3 during which time they visited Rome, Naples, Pisa and Turin. In Rome the two brothers sat to Batoni and William Legge befriended Thomas Jenkins whom he was to enlist as agent and advisor. Through Jenkins he met the landscape painter Richard Wilson from whom he commissioned two views of Rome as well as other works and 68 drawings. With Jenkins's help he also acquired paintings by Busiri, Salvator Rosa, Dughet, van der Meulen, Stern and de Momper. It is not known exactly when he came by the current study, but it hung at Lord Dartmouth's home, Sandwell Hall, Staffordshire until the Dartmouth family later moved to Patshull Hall, Staffordshire.


Notes
¹ M. Bury, 'The Senarega Chapel in San Lorenzo, Genoa; New Document about Barocci and Francavilla', Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz, 31. Bd., H. 2/3, 1987, pp. 327-356.
² 'Un difetto solo ha la tavola, che per haver del Divino, lodi humane non vi arrivano: vive per questo involta fra silentio, e maraviglia' (M. Giustiniani, Lettere memorabili, 3 vols., Rome, 1667-1675, II, pp. 209-210, doc. XLV)
³ J. Marciari, I. Verstegen, 'Grande quanto l'opera : size and scale in Barocci's drawings', Master Drawings, XLVI, 3, 2008, pp. 291-321; L. Baroni, 'A cartoon fragment by Barocci for the 'Madonna del popolo'', Master Drawings, 60, 4, 2022, pp. 303-310
⁴ L. Baroni, 'L'Orazione funebre per Federico Barocci di Vittorio Venturelli', Accademia Raffaello. Atti e studi, 1, 2015, pp. 61-90
⁵ E.P. Pillsbury, 'The oil studies of Federico Barocci', Apollo, CVIII (1978), pp. 70- 73
⁶ Inv. PD.1-2002.
⁷ Inv. 85.GG.26.
⁸ See L. Baroni, 'Federico Barocci', in M. Ciliberto, ed., Enciclopedia dell'Umanesimo e del Rinascimento, Pisa-Florence 2024, forthcoming
⁹ Inv. 1976.87.1; 1976.87.2.
¹⁰ Inv. 462, 481; see D. Prytz, 'Two unpublished oil studies by Federico Barocci in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm', The Burlington, CLIII, 1303, 2011, pp. 653-656
¹¹ A. Emiliani, 'La Sepoltura di Cristo di Federico Barocci in Santa Croce di Senigallia: un inedito "bozzetto per i colori" e altri contributi alla conoscenza dell'artista', Artibus et historiae, XIII, 25 (1992), pp. 9-46
¹² Inv. 1944_100.
¹³ RCIN 902343.
¹⁴ Sale, Dominic Winter Auctioneers, 8 March 2023, lot 2 (as Attributed to Federico Barocci)
¹⁵ Inv. 2006.11.4.
¹⁶ Ref. PIC.160.
¹⁷ Inv. 167.
¹⁸ On Vitali see A. Marchi, 'Alessandro Vitali', in A. M. Ambrosini Massari, ed., Nel segno di Barocci : allievi e seguaci tra Marche, Umbria, Siena, Milan 2005, pp. 134-41