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Lot Essay
Margherita Gonzaga was the eldest daughter of Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga and his wife Eleonora de' Medici. She was born in 1591; in 1606 she married the heir to the Dukedom of Lorraine, Henri, Duc de Bar. She died in Nancy in 1632.
The Gonzaga Family adoring the Trinity was painted to be displayed above the high altar in the chapel of the Jesuit Church of Santissima Trinit in Mantua; it was flanked by The Baptism of Christ now in the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, and the Transfiguration, now in the Muse des Beaux-Arts, in Nancy. It was the most prominent and important commission Rubens was to receive from his master and patron in Italy, Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga (1562-1612). The three pictures may have been considered and planned in 1601 in Mantua, shortly after Rubens' arrival in Italy and his entry into the service of the Duke. The three pictures were ready by May 1605 as Rubens had been in the intervening period only intermittently in Mantua; his final campaign to complete the commission began probably on his return to Mantua from Rome in August 1604.
Following the French occupation of Mantua, the Baptism and then the Transfiguration were removed, while the Gonzaga Family adoring the Trinity was left to decay in the chapel which along with the church had been converted into a storage depot. The story of what exactly happened to the painting is then somewhat confused - it may have been mutilated by a French colonel - but at all events the commander of the French military police, Etienne Marie Siauve, authorised work to preserve the painting in 1801. It was decided that to save as much as possible, the lateral portraits at least should be cut out. The work was done by Felice Campi (1746-1817), vice-director of the Accademia Vergiliana Felice in Mantua and Luigi Rados (1773-1840). Norris, op. cit., pp. 77-78, note 23, prints both reports by Siauve and Campi; the former's may well have been disingenuous (for a full account of the mutilation of the painting, see Schizzerotto, op. cit., pp. 99ff.). But Campi stated that he and Rados had spent 'an entire day, outlining .... the different and most precious areas, which I then divided, with the greatest care for the personages', for 'we had decided that the most advantageous course .. was to reline the heads, shoulder-length portraits and the more remarkable persons ....'. The catalogue of the 1937 Gonzaga exhibition suggested that this fragment remained in Mantua in the collection of Alessandro Nievo until circa 1870, a proposal that Burchard doubted, but that Huemer inclined to accept.
The two central portions of the painting have remained at Mantua (since 1933 exhibited in the Palazzo Ducale). These measure 185 x 462 cm.; as much or more than 100 cm. may have been lost at either side.
The whereabouts of five other fragments from the lower section are known. The most up-to-date diagram showing the likely original disposition of the extant fragments is given by U. Bazzotti, 'Precisazione sulla Pala della Trinit a Mantova', in Rubens dell'Italia all Europa, ed. C. Limentani Virdis and F. Bottacin, Vincenza, 1992, p. 46, fig. 31; the penultimate diagram was last published by Jaff, op. cit., 1989, p. 154. Princess Margherita, who like her brother Vincenzo opposite her, looks out at the spectator, stands on the right placed behind her mother and sister, Eleonora. Whether a lance, held by a putative guard to the sitter's right, runs through the left-hand part of the present work, as per the diagrams could best be established by cleaning. The seeming ermine edge to a robe, at the top right-hand side - apparently integral, although no technical photography has been made - has yet to be fully explained.
The Gonzaga Family adoring the Trinity was painted to be displayed above the high altar in the chapel of the Jesuit Church of Santissima Trinit in Mantua; it was flanked by The Baptism of Christ now in the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, and the Transfiguration, now in the Muse des Beaux-Arts, in Nancy. It was the most prominent and important commission Rubens was to receive from his master and patron in Italy, Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga (1562-1612). The three pictures may have been considered and planned in 1601 in Mantua, shortly after Rubens' arrival in Italy and his entry into the service of the Duke. The three pictures were ready by May 1605 as Rubens had been in the intervening period only intermittently in Mantua; his final campaign to complete the commission began probably on his return to Mantua from Rome in August 1604.
Following the French occupation of Mantua, the Baptism and then the Transfiguration were removed, while the Gonzaga Family adoring the Trinity was left to decay in the chapel which along with the church had been converted into a storage depot. The story of what exactly happened to the painting is then somewhat confused - it may have been mutilated by a French colonel - but at all events the commander of the French military police, Etienne Marie Siauve, authorised work to preserve the painting in 1801. It was decided that to save as much as possible, the lateral portraits at least should be cut out. The work was done by Felice Campi (1746-1817), vice-director of the Accademia Vergiliana Felice in Mantua and Luigi Rados (1773-1840). Norris, op. cit., pp. 77-78, note 23, prints both reports by Siauve and Campi; the former's may well have been disingenuous (for a full account of the mutilation of the painting, see Schizzerotto, op. cit., pp. 99ff.). But Campi stated that he and Rados had spent 'an entire day, outlining .... the different and most precious areas, which I then divided, with the greatest care for the personages', for 'we had decided that the most advantageous course .. was to reline the heads, shoulder-length portraits and the more remarkable persons ....'. The catalogue of the 1937 Gonzaga exhibition suggested that this fragment remained in Mantua in the collection of Alessandro Nievo until circa 1870, a proposal that Burchard doubted, but that Huemer inclined to accept.
The two central portions of the painting have remained at Mantua (since 1933 exhibited in the Palazzo Ducale). These measure 185 x 462 cm.; as much or more than 100 cm. may have been lost at either side.
The whereabouts of five other fragments from the lower section are known. The most up-to-date diagram showing the likely original disposition of the extant fragments is given by U. Bazzotti, 'Precisazione sulla Pala della Trinit a Mantova', in Rubens dell'Italia all Europa, ed. C. Limentani Virdis and F. Bottacin, Vincenza, 1992, p. 46, fig. 31; the penultimate diagram was last published by Jaff, op. cit., 1989, p. 154. Princess Margherita, who like her brother Vincenzo opposite her, looks out at the spectator, stands on the right placed behind her mother and sister, Eleonora. Whether a lance, held by a putative guard to the sitter's right, runs through the left-hand part of the present work, as per the diagrams could best be established by cleaning. The seeming ermine edge to a robe, at the top right-hand side - apparently integral, although no technical photography has been made - has yet to be fully explained.