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Lot Essay
In this distinguished portrait, renowned polymath Galileo Galilei is shown seated, half-length, holding a telescope in one hand. On the other hand he wears a rectangular ring received by all members of the prestigious scientific and cultural society, the Accademia dei Lincei. Galileo was appointed to the society in 1611, and it appears that the institution became so fundamental to his identity that he adopted the signature ‘Galileo Galilei Linceo’. It is presumed that he is shown here in the last years of his life, around 1640, before his death in 1642.
Several recorded versions of this composition exist, including in Palazzo Pitti, Florence, and Royal Museums, Greenwich, and much discussion has ensued regarding their early histories and the probable prototype. Recent scholarship acknowledges the quality of the present work and the Greenwich version, suggesting that they are either very close to a lost prime, or that one of them is the prototype. Stoppato calls the present canvas ‘clearly an original work and may well be the prototype for most of the copies known today’ (op. cit., p. 51), whilst Tognoni agrees, describing it as ‘il…prototipo, o comunque un esemplare assai vicino all’originale’ (2013, op. cit., p. 63). The Greenwich picture and the present version do differ in several details, including the design of the chair back, telescope and ring. The Greenwich portrait also includes Galileo’s full hand, with more of the chair arm. Cusping is visible along the top edge of the present work, but not along the bottom edge, suggesting that it may have been reduced. The Pitti painting also depicts a cropped hand, reinforcing Tognoni’s suggestion that it was based on this painting (ibid.).
The picture is first recorded in the collection of Prince Stanislaus Poniatowski as ‘Domenico Passignano’, a Florentine artist who is known to have corresponded with Galileo regarding his own astronomical research into sunspots. Passignano is also noted as the painter after which Tommaso Minardi’s (1787-1871) drawing, and subsequently Pietro Bettelini’s (1763-1829) engraving were created. The engraving has been traditionally connected to the present work but differs in details like buttons down Galileo’s jacket, and the back of his chair.
By the time this painting was lent by the Marquess of Lansdowne to the British Institution in 1854, it was given to Justus Sustermans, court painter to the Grand Dukes of Tuscany. It was later called ‘Florentine School, 17th century’ in an 1897 collection catalogue, and these two attributions have been much debated throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries (see Literature). More recently on the basis of photographs, Francesca Baldassari has suggested that the work was painted by an artist in Sustermans’ studio. Francesco Petrucci has proposed that it is an autograph painting by Sustermans and connects it to the portrait recorded by Vincenzo Viviani in the collection of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, as ‘di maniera più risoluta, tutto di colpi’ that ‘da vicino par strapazzato’, in contrast with the other recorded portrait of Galileo by Sustermans in the Uffizi, Florence, painted in 1635 and presented to Grand Duke Ferdinand de’ Medici after the sitter’s death, which Viviani described as ‘finito con morbidezza’ (C. Pizzorusso, in Sustermans: sessant’anni alla corte dei Medici, exhibition catalogue, Florence, 1983, pp. 58-59, under nos. 33 and 34).
We are grateful to Francesco Petrucci for his assistance with the cataloguing of this lot and to Francesca Baldassari for her opinion on the attribution.
Several recorded versions of this composition exist, including in Palazzo Pitti, Florence, and Royal Museums, Greenwich, and much discussion has ensued regarding their early histories and the probable prototype. Recent scholarship acknowledges the quality of the present work and the Greenwich version, suggesting that they are either very close to a lost prime, or that one of them is the prototype. Stoppato calls the present canvas ‘clearly an original work and may well be the prototype for most of the copies known today’ (op. cit., p. 51), whilst Tognoni agrees, describing it as ‘il…prototipo, o comunque un esemplare assai vicino all’originale’ (2013, op. cit., p. 63). The Greenwich picture and the present version do differ in several details, including the design of the chair back, telescope and ring. The Greenwich portrait also includes Galileo’s full hand, with more of the chair arm. Cusping is visible along the top edge of the present work, but not along the bottom edge, suggesting that it may have been reduced. The Pitti painting also depicts a cropped hand, reinforcing Tognoni’s suggestion that it was based on this painting (ibid.).
The picture is first recorded in the collection of Prince Stanislaus Poniatowski as ‘Domenico Passignano’, a Florentine artist who is known to have corresponded with Galileo regarding his own astronomical research into sunspots. Passignano is also noted as the painter after which Tommaso Minardi’s (1787-1871) drawing, and subsequently Pietro Bettelini’s (1763-1829) engraving were created. The engraving has been traditionally connected to the present work but differs in details like buttons down Galileo’s jacket, and the back of his chair.
By the time this painting was lent by the Marquess of Lansdowne to the British Institution in 1854, it was given to Justus Sustermans, court painter to the Grand Dukes of Tuscany. It was later called ‘Florentine School, 17th century’ in an 1897 collection catalogue, and these two attributions have been much debated throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries (see Literature). More recently on the basis of photographs, Francesca Baldassari has suggested that the work was painted by an artist in Sustermans’ studio. Francesco Petrucci has proposed that it is an autograph painting by Sustermans and connects it to the portrait recorded by Vincenzo Viviani in the collection of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, as ‘di maniera più risoluta, tutto di colpi’ that ‘da vicino par strapazzato’, in contrast with the other recorded portrait of Galileo by Sustermans in the Uffizi, Florence, painted in 1635 and presented to Grand Duke Ferdinand de’ Medici after the sitter’s death, which Viviani described as ‘finito con morbidezza’ (C. Pizzorusso, in Sustermans: sessant’anni alla corte dei Medici, exhibition catalogue, Florence, 1983, pp. 58-59, under nos. 33 and 34).
We are grateful to Francesco Petrucci for his assistance with the cataloguing of this lot and to Francesca Baldassari for her opinion on the attribution.