The Feast of Absalom

Details

Mattia Preti (Taverna, Calabria 1613-1699 Valletta, Malta)
The Feast of Absalom
oil on canvas
46 x 66¼ in. (116.8 x 168.2 cm.)

Provenance

Anon. Sale, Sotheby's, New York, 25 March 1982, lot 83, as 'Attributed to Preti'.
with Piero Corsini Inc., New York.
Dr. Carl Croce, Philadelphia; Christie's, New York, 14 January 1993, lot 164 (sold $49,500).

Literature

M. Laskin and M. Pantazzi, Catalogue of the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 1987, I, pp. 232-3.
M. Marini 'Mattia Preti, la sua visione e i suoi seguaci', in Mattia Preti, E Corace, ed., Rome, 1989, pp. 146 and 157, note 12.
J. T. Spike, Mattia Preti, Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Florence, 1999, p. 367, no. 305, illustrated p. 368.

Exhibited

Northampton, Smith College Museum of Art, Baroque Painters in Italy, 17 November 1989-8 February 1990 (no catalogue).
Wilmington, Delaware Art Museum, Mostly Baroque: Italian Paintings and Drawings from the Carlo Croce Collection, 24 April-14 June 1992 (no catalogue).

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

The subject is taken from Samuel, XIII: v. 28, and describes how Absalom, son of King David, sought revenge on his half-brother Amnon, for the rape of his sister Tamar. He invited the unsuspecting Amnon to a banquet and after lulling him with wine and food, he signalled his assassins to murder him.

The present picture, regarded by John Spike (loc. cit) as 'an important early work from the mid 1630s', is the artist's earliest known treatment of a subject that he painted later in two famous pictures now in the Museo di Capodimonte, Naples, and the National Gallery of Canada.

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