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Lot Essay
While the attribution to Giulio Romano of this drawing poses no problem, its subject presents, in the words of Frederick Hartt, ‘a complete iconographic enigma’ (op. cit., p. 225). Hartt seems to have favored an identification of the figures as Venus, Cupid and the Three Graces, but a more plausible one – already proposed in the catalogue of the 1836 exhibition – sees in the composition a scene from the story of Cupid and the princess Psyche, told by the Latin author Apuleius in the fourth book of his Metamorphoses, best known as The Golden Ass (the identification is developed by V. Taylor in exhib. cat., 1999, op. cit., p. 126). The agitation, in particular of the central seated figure and the two women flanking her, strongly suggests she is Psyche accompanied by her two sisters, preparing her for the marriage, predicted to their father by the Oracle at Delphi, to a monster. In the drawing, the sisters may very well be preparing her for this ‘marriage’, which she was to attend in funeral attire, and which was to take place on the highest mountain (to which Cupid is perhaps pointing) of their father’s kingdom. The third woman, who shares in the dismay of the others, could be a servant.
If one accepts this identification of the subject, it is tempting to relate the drawing to Giulio Romano’s decoration illustrating the story of Psyche in the Camera di Psiche at the Palazzo Te in Mantua, on which he worked for the Duke of Mantua in the years around 1530 (A. Belluzzi, Palazzo Te a Mantova/ The Palazzo Te in Mantua, Modena, 1998, I, pp. 371-390, II, pp. 200-281, figs. 395-511). However, the rectangular format of the composition does not fit with the frescoes of the room, and there is no corresponding scene. It has been suggested that the drawing should rather be related to the stucco decoration of the square compartments in the palazzo’s Camera degli Stucchi (ibid., I, pp. 424-439, II, pp. 394-423, figs. 784-842), but this seems equally unconvincing. If the drawing remains unrelated to any known painting or decoration in any other medium for the Gonzaga pleasure palace, its style indicates it must have been made during the exciting times when Giulio was working on the Palazzo Te, perhaps specifically in the early 1530s. Among others, comparable drawings can be found at the Musée du Louvre (inv. 3528, 3503; see Robert Serra in “Con nuova e stravagante maniera”. Giulio Romano a Mantova, exhib. cat., Mantua, Palazzo Ducale, 2019-2020, nos. 21, 27, ill.).
If one accepts this identification of the subject, it is tempting to relate the drawing to Giulio Romano’s decoration illustrating the story of Psyche in the Camera di Psiche at the Palazzo Te in Mantua, on which he worked for the Duke of Mantua in the years around 1530 (A. Belluzzi, Palazzo Te a Mantova/ The Palazzo Te in Mantua, Modena, 1998, I, pp. 371-390, II, pp. 200-281, figs. 395-511). However, the rectangular format of the composition does not fit with the frescoes of the room, and there is no corresponding scene. It has been suggested that the drawing should rather be related to the stucco decoration of the square compartments in the palazzo’s Camera degli Stucchi (ibid., I, pp. 424-439, II, pp. 394-423, figs. 784-842), but this seems equally unconvincing. If the drawing remains unrelated to any known painting or decoration in any other medium for the Gonzaga pleasure palace, its style indicates it must have been made during the exciting times when Giulio was working on the Palazzo Te, perhaps specifically in the early 1530s. Among others, comparable drawings can be found at the Musée du Louvre (inv. 3528, 3503; see Robert Serra in “Con nuova e stravagante maniera”. Giulio Romano a Mantova, exhib. cat., Mantua, Palazzo Ducale, 2019-2020, nos. 21, 27, ill.).