Lot Essay
The reverse of the panel is decorated with the original grotteschi.
The present painting is an early work by Fra Bartolommeo, painted several years before he became a friar. Probably datable between the Volterra Annunciation of 1497 and the Last Judgement commissioned by Gerozzo Dini in 1499, this panel is stylistically closest to a small pair of shutters in the Uffizi, Florence that Bartolomeo di Paolo de Fattorino, as he was then called, executed for Piero di Francesco del Pugliese who died in 1498.
Chris Fischer (op. cit.) notes that a black chalk drawing by Fra Bartolommeo in Rotterdam (Inv. no. N93) (fig. 1) is related both to the small tabernacle in the artist's Vision of St. Bernard in the Uffizi, Florence (fig. 2), and to the present lot. The Saint Bernard altarpiece was commissioned on November 18, 1504 and finished in 1507 which would, therefore, suppose a slightly later dating of circa 1504-5 for this Crucifixion.
Everett Fahy has pointed out that what Fischer labels a 'tabernacle' in the Vision of Saint Bernard, is actually a small trompe-l'oeil painting propped up by a book in the center foreground of the altarpiece. He notes that such small, independent paintings were customarily used as paxes; the one in the Saint Bernard altarpiece would have been placed immediately above the central position of the tabernacle that held the host on the altar during mass. Fischer writes that small Crucifixions also served as leafs for private devotional diptychs, 'the so-called libretti, of which two are mentioned in Father Cavalcanti's list of Fra Bartolommeo's works compiled in 1516' (ibid., p. 81).
The other half of the diptych, for which the present panel most probably formed a libretto, represents a Nativity, and is now in the J.B. Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky (fig. 3).
We are most grateful to Mr. Everett Fahy for his assistance in cataloguing this painting. He will publish the painting in the catalogue of the forthcoming Fra Bartolommeo exhibition to be held in the Spring of 1995 at the Palazzo Pitti, Florence.
The present painting is an early work by Fra Bartolommeo, painted several years before he became a friar. Probably datable between the Volterra Annunciation of 1497 and the Last Judgement commissioned by Gerozzo Dini in 1499, this panel is stylistically closest to a small pair of shutters in the Uffizi, Florence that Bartolomeo di Paolo de Fattorino, as he was then called, executed for Piero di Francesco del Pugliese who died in 1498.
Chris Fischer (op. cit.) notes that a black chalk drawing by Fra Bartolommeo in Rotterdam (Inv. no. N93) (fig. 1) is related both to the small tabernacle in the artist's Vision of St. Bernard in the Uffizi, Florence (fig. 2), and to the present lot. The Saint Bernard altarpiece was commissioned on November 18, 1504 and finished in 1507 which would, therefore, suppose a slightly later dating of circa 1504-5 for this Crucifixion.
Everett Fahy has pointed out that what Fischer labels a 'tabernacle' in the Vision of Saint Bernard, is actually a small trompe-l'oeil painting propped up by a book in the center foreground of the altarpiece. He notes that such small, independent paintings were customarily used as paxes; the one in the Saint Bernard altarpiece would have been placed immediately above the central position of the tabernacle that held the host on the altar during mass. Fischer writes that small Crucifixions also served as leafs for private devotional diptychs, 'the so-called libretti, of which two are mentioned in Father Cavalcanti's list of Fra Bartolommeo's works compiled in 1516' (ibid., p. 81).
The other half of the diptych, for which the present panel most probably formed a libretto, represents a Nativity, and is now in the J.B. Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky (fig. 3).
We are most grateful to Mr. Everett Fahy for his assistance in cataloguing this painting. He will publish the painting in the catalogue of the forthcoming Fra Bartolommeo exhibition to be held in the Spring of 1995 at the Palazzo Pitti, Florence.