Scene of witchcraft

Details

PIETRO DANDINI (FLORENCE 1646-1712)
Scene of witchcraft
black chalk, pen and brown ink
9 x 8 1⁄8 in. (23 x 20.5 cm)
with VINCENZO DANDINI (FLORENCE 1607-1675), Three prelates falling, with inscription ‘V. D. v.’ (lower right), pen and brown ink, watermark star in a circle surmounted by a cross, and letter ‘B’ below, 6 7⁄8 x 7 in. (17.6 x 18 cm)
(2)

Provenance

Private collection, United States.

The additional drawing:
Dandini collection, Florence.
Giovanni Targioni Tozzetti (1712-1783), Florence.
Private collection, United States.

Literature

S. Bellesi, Diavolerie, magie e incantesimi nella pittura barocca fiorentina, Florence, 1997, p. 44, ill.

The additional drawing:
S. Bellesi, Diavolerie, magie e incantesimi nella pittura barocca fiorentina, Florence, 1997, p. 78.
S. Bellesi, Vincenzo Dandini e la pittura a Firenze alla metà del Seicento, Pisa, 2003, no. 24, ill.

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

The two drawings are interesting examples of the draftsmanship of the Florentine Vincenzo and Pietro (Pier) Dandini. Pier Dandini’s composition reflects the artist’s fervent creativity and imagination in inventing ‘diavoli e mostri bizzarri’, a quality already praised in the 18th Century by his biographers (see S. Bellesi, ‘Una vita inedita di Pier Dandini’, Rivista d’Arte, VII, 1991, p. 157). Vincenzo’s drawing with Three prelates falling can be related to a painting of the Fall of Simon Magus, known only through documentary sources, once in the Targioni Tozzetti collection in Florence (Bellesi, op. cit., 2003, no. 24).

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