Roman School
Four Female Virtues
SOLD

PROVENANCE: With Crispian Riley-Smith, 2002, catalogue, 'Master Drawings' number 3.

Private New York collection till 2010.

Inscribed Correggio [crosses two drawings]

Black chalk, pen and brown ink, brown wash, heightened with white, on paper prepared with a yellow wash

Overall size: 208 x 133 mm. (8 x 5 3/8 in.)

Hugo Chapman has suggested that these drawings could be by an artist working in Rome in the late 16th Century, early 17th Century, and possibly someone near Giovanni Baglione (c.1575-1643/4). Nicholas Turner agrees with Chapman that the drawings are Roman School, late 16th Century, however Turner thinks that our drawings come closer to Giovanni de Vecchi (1536?-1615), and compares our drawings to Saint John the Evangelist in the Metropolitan Museum of Art1. Turner also makes a comparison to the drawings now given to Avanzino Nucci after the so-called Polidoro Album in the Fondation Custodia2.

Dr. Eitel-Porter has suggested that our drawings could be Roman or Neapolitan, and date to the late 16th Century. She suggests alternative attributions to Belisario Corenzio. Moreover Eitel-Porter suggests that our drawings could be an as yet unidentified artist, but whose work we know in various examples in the British Museum3 and The Arts Institute of Chicago4.

It has also been suggested that the figures are close to Orlando Parentinis (fl.1562-1593?) work in the Palazzetto del Belvedere, in the Appartamento di Ritiro of Pius IV, in the Vatican5.

1. J. Bean, 15th and 16th Century Italian Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1982, no.266.

2. J. Byam-Sham, The Italian Drawings of the Frits Lugt Collection, Volume II, Polidoro Album, 1983, Paris, and J. Katalan, A. Nucci and the Polidoro Album Master Drawings, XXVIII, 1990, pp.173-180.

3. N.Turner, Roman Baroque Drawings, c.1620-c.1700, London, 1999, p.229 and plate 363.

4.S. Folds McCullagh and L. Giles, Italian Drawings before 1600 in the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, 1997, no. 388, p.292.

5. C. Pietrangeli, The Paintings in the Vatican, 1996, pp.412-3.