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拍品专文
These panels, which once formed part of a predella, are by Benvenuto di Giovanni, one of the foremost artists working in Siena in the second half of the fifteenth century. The predella was originally composed of seven three-quarter-length figures, six of which were acquired by Robert Lehman in October 1920. In addition to the present works, which show Saint Dominic and Christ Blessing, a panel showing Saint Bernardino of Siena remained in the Lehman collection and is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, while one of Saint Peter Martyr was presented to Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven. A panel with Saint Francis is now in the Houston Museum of Fine Arts while the last, thought to be of Saint Anthony of Padua, remains untraced.
As the surviving panels represent the three principal Franciscan saints and two of the three foremost Dominican saints, Carolyn Wilson (op. cit., 1996, p. 183) hypothesized that the seventh panel may have shown Saint Thomas Aquinas or, alternatively, Catherine of Siena, the saint often paired with Bernardino in Sienese late quattrocento art. In reconstructing the original predella, Wilson suggested the present panel of Christ was flanked on either side by Saints Dominic and Francis, both of whom turned towards the Savior, with Saints Bernardino and Anthony of Padua occupying positions at either end, thereby leaving the central left section to the missing panel and that on the right to Saint Peter Martyr (ibid.).
Berenson (op. cit., 1932) was the first to identify these panels as by Benvenuto di Giovanni, an attribution supported by Van Marle and, subsequently Fredericksen and Davisson (op. cit., 1972 ), who proposed a date of c. 1474, while comparing it stylistically with Benvenuto’s dated Biccherna panel representing an Allegory of Good Government (Siena, Archivio di Stato). Maria Cristina Bandera (op. cit., 1974) later observed that the punch-marks for these works were comparable with the artist’s six pilaster panels from the Kress Collection (three in the Isaac Delgado Museum, New Orleans; and three in the Samek Art Museum, Bucknell University, Lewisburg), but are otherwise unique in Benvenuto’s oeuvre. She further noted the stylistic affinities with both the Lehman and Kress series of panels with the signed and dated Montepertuso Altarpiece (1475; Vescovado di Murlo). This dating and reconstruction was accepted by Pope-Hennessy (op. cit., 1987). While noting that Zeri had first reassigned the Kress panels to Benvenuto and had suggested they formed part of the frame for the artist’s San Domenico altarpiece, Wilson advanced the theory that both this and the Lehman series formed the pilaster and predella of the San Domenico pala (op. cit., 1996, p. 186).
The unusual pastiglia wreaths that surround the present panels and their counterparts from the Lehman series have long been the subject of scholarly discussion. While no precise analogy has been found, Bandera associated this detail in the predella with Sienese cassone decoration from the third quarter of the fifteenth century and most agree that it can be viewed as the modernization of an older convention (ibid., p. 183).
Benvenuto di Giovanni may have been a pupil of the most versatile Sienese artist of the mid-quattrocento, Lorenzo Vecchietta, but was also influenced by Sano di Pietro, to whose innate conservatism he must have responded. He is first recorded as an artist in 1453, working on the frescoes at the Siena Baptistry alongside Vecchietta. It marked the start of a long career, with his style evolving over subsequent years as he embraced influences from beyond Siena, leaving a significant body of work that demonstrated the artist’s sustained popularity. His first signed and dated work was the Annunciation of 1466 made for the church of San Girolamo di Volterra, a painting in part inspired by Simone Martini’s celebrated Annunciation of 1333 (Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi). In the following years he refined his elegant style, breaking away from Vecchietta’s influence and responding to the work of Liberale da Verona and Girolamo da Cremona, the Lombard miniaturists who had arrived in Siena in 1466 and 1470, respectively. The 1470s witnessed the start of a close association with Sano di Pietro and a series of ambitious altarpieces that marked the highpoint of Benvenuto’s career, notably the Montepertuso Altarpiece of 1475 and the Borghesi Altarpiece for the Sienese church of San Domenico, completed in 1478. In the following decade Benvenuto was commissioned to design the floor decoration of Siena cathedral, and would begin in time to collaborate more frequently with his son, Girolamo di Benvenuto (1470-1524).
As the surviving panels represent the three principal Franciscan saints and two of the three foremost Dominican saints, Carolyn Wilson (op. cit., 1996, p. 183) hypothesized that the seventh panel may have shown Saint Thomas Aquinas or, alternatively, Catherine of Siena, the saint often paired with Bernardino in Sienese late quattrocento art. In reconstructing the original predella, Wilson suggested the present panel of Christ was flanked on either side by Saints Dominic and Francis, both of whom turned towards the Savior, with Saints Bernardino and Anthony of Padua occupying positions at either end, thereby leaving the central left section to the missing panel and that on the right to Saint Peter Martyr (ibid.).
Berenson (op. cit., 1932) was the first to identify these panels as by Benvenuto di Giovanni, an attribution supported by Van Marle and, subsequently Fredericksen and Davisson (op. cit., 1972 ), who proposed a date of c. 1474, while comparing it stylistically with Benvenuto’s dated Biccherna panel representing an Allegory of Good Government (Siena, Archivio di Stato). Maria Cristina Bandera (op. cit., 1974) later observed that the punch-marks for these works were comparable with the artist’s six pilaster panels from the Kress Collection (three in the Isaac Delgado Museum, New Orleans; and three in the Samek Art Museum, Bucknell University, Lewisburg), but are otherwise unique in Benvenuto’s oeuvre. She further noted the stylistic affinities with both the Lehman and Kress series of panels with the signed and dated Montepertuso Altarpiece (1475; Vescovado di Murlo). This dating and reconstruction was accepted by Pope-Hennessy (op. cit., 1987). While noting that Zeri had first reassigned the Kress panels to Benvenuto and had suggested they formed part of the frame for the artist’s San Domenico altarpiece, Wilson advanced the theory that both this and the Lehman series formed the pilaster and predella of the San Domenico pala (op. cit., 1996, p. 186).
The unusual pastiglia wreaths that surround the present panels and their counterparts from the Lehman series have long been the subject of scholarly discussion. While no precise analogy has been found, Bandera associated this detail in the predella with Sienese cassone decoration from the third quarter of the fifteenth century and most agree that it can be viewed as the modernization of an older convention (ibid., p. 183).
Benvenuto di Giovanni may have been a pupil of the most versatile Sienese artist of the mid-quattrocento, Lorenzo Vecchietta, but was also influenced by Sano di Pietro, to whose innate conservatism he must have responded. He is first recorded as an artist in 1453, working on the frescoes at the Siena Baptistry alongside Vecchietta. It marked the start of a long career, with his style evolving over subsequent years as he embraced influences from beyond Siena, leaving a significant body of work that demonstrated the artist’s sustained popularity. His first signed and dated work was the Annunciation of 1466 made for the church of San Girolamo di Volterra, a painting in part inspired by Simone Martini’s celebrated Annunciation of 1333 (Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi). In the following years he refined his elegant style, breaking away from Vecchietta’s influence and responding to the work of Liberale da Verona and Girolamo da Cremona, the Lombard miniaturists who had arrived in Siena in 1466 and 1470, respectively. The 1470s witnessed the start of a close association with Sano di Pietro and a series of ambitious altarpieces that marked the highpoint of Benvenuto’s career, notably the Montepertuso Altarpiece of 1475 and the Borghesi Altarpiece for the Sienese church of San Domenico, completed in 1478. In the following decade Benvenuto was commissioned to design the floor decoration of Siena cathedral, and would begin in time to collaborate more frequently with his son, Girolamo di Benvenuto (1470-1524).