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Provenant de la collection Himmelheber
GIOVANNI FRANCESCO BARBIERI, IL GUERCINO (GENTO 1591-1666 BOLOGNE)
Saint Jean-Baptiste dans le désert
Details
GIOVANNI FRANCESCO BARBIERI, IL GUERCINO (GENTO 1591-1666 BOLOGNE)
Saint Jean-Baptiste dans le désert
inscrit ‘ECCE AGNUS DEI’ (sur le ruban) et avec datation ‘1623’ (en bas au centre) et avec inscriptions ‘A 988 f’ et ‘Guercino’ (verso)
plume et encre brune, lavis brun et gris
25,1 x 34,4 cm (9 7⁄8 × 13 3⁄8 in.)
Saint Jean-Baptiste dans le désert
inscrit ‘ECCE AGNUS DEI’ (sur le ruban) et avec datation ‘1623’ (en bas au centre) et avec inscriptions ‘A 988 f’ et ‘Guercino’ (verso)
plume et encre brune, lavis brun et gris
25,1 x 34,4 cm (9 7⁄8 × 13 3⁄8 in.)
Provenance
Jan van Rijmsdijk (c. 1730-1790), Londres, vers 1770 (L. 2167), avec son inscription associée ‘Rymdyk's Museum’; sa vente, Greenwood's, Londres, 29 mars 1790** a vérifier**
Sir. Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), Londres, (Lugt 2364); probablement sa vente, A.C de Poggi, Londres, 26 mai 1794 **A vérifier **
Johann Georg von Sachsen (1869-1938), Freiburg-im-Breisgau; sa vente, Ketterer, Stuttgart, 27 octobre 1949, lot 860.
Philipp Hermann (1899-1968), Karlsruhe (L. 1352a), puis par descendance,
Georg Himmelheber (1929-2024), Munich, puis par descendance.
Sir. Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), Londres, (Lugt 2364); probablement sa vente, A.C de Poggi, Londres, 26 mai 1794 **A vérifier **
Johann Georg von Sachsen (1869-1938), Freiburg-im-Breisgau; sa vente, Ketterer, Stuttgart, 27 octobre 1949, lot 860.
Philipp Hermann (1899-1968), Karlsruhe (L. 1352a), puis par descendance,
Georg Himmelheber (1929-2024), Munich, puis par descendance.
Literature
J. Tonkovich, ‘Jan van Rymsdyk and His ‘Museum,’’ Master Drawings, 60, n°4, 2022 (supplément à l'article en ligne www.masterdrawings.org, n° 53, non illustré).
Further Details
GIOVANNI FRANCESCO BARBIERI, IL GUERCINO, SAINT JOHN THE BAPTIST IN THE WILDERNESS, PEN AND BROWN INK, BROWN AND GREY WASH
In this meticulous drawing with its highly refined composition, Guercino employs a technique characteristic of a distinct part of his graphic œuvre: a very fine pen, used to delineate contours in brown ink, combined with brown and grey wash to model the volumes with remarkable subtlety. By way of comparison, one may cite an Annunciation preserved at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm (N. Turner, The Paintings of Guercino. A Revised and Expanded Catalogue Raisonné, Rome, 2017, no. 14a).
Guercino returned on several occasions to the figure of Saint John the Baptist, whether as a child alongside the infant Christ on the Virgin’s lap, or as an adult in the wilderness. Another drawing depicting the saint as an adult, executed in pen and brown ink heightened with brown wash and dated to around 1640-1655, is preserved at Windsor Castle, London: Portrait of Saint John the Baptist in Contemplation (inv. A, p. 61; D. Mahon, N. Turner, The Drawings of Guercino in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle, Cambridge, 1989, no. 221). An oil on canvas of the same subject, though of a very different composition, is housed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (inv. GG_240; Turner, op. cit., no. 272). Treated almost as a half‑length devotional portrait, with the landscape scarcely indicated in the background, the composition shows Saint John the Baptist seated on a rock, raising one hand towards the heavens while holding his cross in the other.
This drawing once belonged to Jan van Rymsdyk, the 18th Century Dutch artist active in London, whose collection has recently been the subject of renewed study by Jennifer Tonkovich. She identifies a group of 57 drawings, including another work by Guercino depicting a Bust‑length Peasant in black chalk (Washington, National Gallery of Art, inv. 1974.102.1; Tonkovich, op. cit., online). Rymsdyk’s collector’s mark is clearly visible: he frequently inscribed “Rymsdyk’s Museum” on the recto of his drawings, though the inscription is sometimes crossed out. A specialist in anatomical studies, he executed numerous commissions for illustrated publications in this field. His collection consisted primarily of Italian drawings from the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries—among them works by Lorenzo di Bicci and Bramante - as well as a significant group of Netherlandish drawings from the same periods (Tonkovich, op. cit., 2022).
This Saint John the Baptist later entered the collection of the English painter Joshua Reynolds at the end of the eighteenth century.
We are grateful to David Stone for confirming the attribution after photograph examination and for his assistance in preparing this catalogue entry.
In this meticulous drawing with its highly refined composition, Guercino employs a technique characteristic of a distinct part of his graphic œuvre: a very fine pen, used to delineate contours in brown ink, combined with brown and grey wash to model the volumes with remarkable subtlety. By way of comparison, one may cite an Annunciation preserved at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm (N. Turner, The Paintings of Guercino. A Revised and Expanded Catalogue Raisonné, Rome, 2017, no. 14a).
Guercino returned on several occasions to the figure of Saint John the Baptist, whether as a child alongside the infant Christ on the Virgin’s lap, or as an adult in the wilderness. Another drawing depicting the saint as an adult, executed in pen and brown ink heightened with brown wash and dated to around 1640-1655, is preserved at Windsor Castle, London: Portrait of Saint John the Baptist in Contemplation (inv. A, p. 61; D. Mahon, N. Turner, The Drawings of Guercino in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle, Cambridge, 1989, no. 221). An oil on canvas of the same subject, though of a very different composition, is housed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (inv. GG_240; Turner, op. cit., no. 272). Treated almost as a half‑length devotional portrait, with the landscape scarcely indicated in the background, the composition shows Saint John the Baptist seated on a rock, raising one hand towards the heavens while holding his cross in the other.
This drawing once belonged to Jan van Rymsdyk, the 18th Century Dutch artist active in London, whose collection has recently been the subject of renewed study by Jennifer Tonkovich. She identifies a group of 57 drawings, including another work by Guercino depicting a Bust‑length Peasant in black chalk (Washington, National Gallery of Art, inv. 1974.102.1; Tonkovich, op. cit., online). Rymsdyk’s collector’s mark is clearly visible: he frequently inscribed “Rymsdyk’s Museum” on the recto of his drawings, though the inscription is sometimes crossed out. A specialist in anatomical studies, he executed numerous commissions for illustrated publications in this field. His collection consisted primarily of Italian drawings from the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries—among them works by Lorenzo di Bicci and Bramante - as well as a significant group of Netherlandish drawings from the same periods (Tonkovich, op. cit., 2022).
This Saint John the Baptist later entered the collection of the English painter Joshua Reynolds at the end of the eighteenth century.
We are grateful to David Stone for confirming the attribution after photograph examination and for his assistance in preparing this catalogue entry.
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