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Lot Essay
Sforza's inscription on the reverse appears to be a slight misunderstanding of an inscription used by his former mentor, Xanto. The inscription should read Pien d'allegrezza Anchise al figliol co(r)re (full of joy, Anchises runs to his son).1
The 'S' mark has been convincingly attributed by Fiocco and Gherardi as a signature for Sforza di Marcantonio del fu Marcantonio de Julianis di Castel Durante,2 who worked with Xanto at Urbino and was much influenced by him. John Mallet argues that 'on the evidence of a lustred dish in the Wallace Collection,3 it would seem that he was already in Urbino and close to Xanto as early as 1535'. Sforza collaborated on the 'Teasel' Service with Xanto,3 and Mallet argues the 'earliest dated pieces to show Sforza's mature style, none of them signed, are from 1543, the year after we lose track of Xanto'.5 Sforza subsequently moved to Pesaro, where he is recorded in 1548, and with the exception of some small unexplained gaps, worked there for decades and died there in 1580.
A group of pieces painted by Sforza at Pesaro are illustrated by Johanna Lessmann, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum Braunschweig, Italienische Majolika, Katalog der Sammlung, Brunswick, 1979, pp. 345-351, including his last known dated and signed work, painted in 1576.
1. We are grateful to John Mallet for this information.
2. Fiocco and Gherardi, 1996, pp. 145-151.
3. A.V.B. Norman, Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Ceramics 1, Pottery, Maiolica, Faience, Stoneware, London, 1976, pp. 184-185, no. C90.
4. Mallet, Exhibition Catalogue, Xanto, Pottery-painter, Poet, Man of the Renaissance, Wallace Collection, London, 2007, pp. 158-159, no. 55.
5. Mallet ibid., 2007, p. 36 and p. 45, note 178, where he cites Giuliana Gardelli, Exhibition Catalogue, A Gran Fuoco, Mostra di Maioliche Rinascimentali dello Stato di Urbino da Collezioni Private, Urbino, Palazzo Ducale, 1987, p. 104, no. 41, and a plate with The Vision of Constantine formerly in the H.A. Cann Collection.
The 'S' mark has been convincingly attributed by Fiocco and Gherardi as a signature for Sforza di Marcantonio del fu Marcantonio de Julianis di Castel Durante,
A group of pieces painted by Sforza at Pesaro are illustrated by Johanna Lessmann, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum Braunschweig, Italienische Majolika, Katalog der Sammlung, Brunswick, 1979, pp. 345-351, including his last known dated and signed work, painted in 1576.
1. We are grateful to John Mallet for this information.
2. Fiocco and Gherardi, 1996, pp. 145-151.
3. A.V.B. Norman, Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Ceramics 1, Pottery, Maiolica, Faience, Stoneware, London, 1976, pp. 184-185, no. C90.
4. Mallet, Exhibition Catalogue, Xanto, Pottery-painter, Poet, Man of the Renaissance, Wallace Collection, London, 2007, pp. 158-159, no. 55.
5. Mallet ibid., 2007, p. 36 and p. 45, note 178, where he cites Giuliana Gardelli, Exhibition Catalogue, A Gran Fuoco, Mostra di Maioliche Rinascimentali dello Stato di Urbino da Collezioni Private, Urbino, Palazzo Ducale, 1987, p. 104, no. 41, and a plate with The Vision of Constantine formerly in the H.A. Cann Collection.