Palazzo Sansedoni (Siena, Italy)
Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saint Bartholomew, Saint Ansanus and a Donor (1318-20)
Saint Lucy (c. 1440)
Saint Jerome (1440)
Frescoed ceiling
Altarpiece (around 1380)
Madonna and Child with Saints John the Baptist, Catherine, Lucy and John the Evangelist
Adoration of the Shepherds (c. 1493)
Reclining Venus with Two Cupids (c. 1510-12)
Holy Family with an Angel (c. 1525)
Madonna of the Veil (c. 1520)
Cleopatra (c. 1570)
Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine of Siena (c. 1600)
Three dancing cupids, in the act of offering fruit
Ancient scene (Selene and Endymion?)
Dead Christ supported by angels, Baptism of Christ, Sermon of the Baptist
Marco Pino Marco di Giovan Battista dal Pino (Siena, 1521 – Naples, 1583) The Baptist's Sermon Oil on canvas, cm 53 x 36 Baptism of Christ Oil on canvas, cm 53 x 36 Dead Christ supported by angels Oil on canvas, cm 53 x 36The three canvases originally came from the Confraternity of S. Giovannino alla Staffa in Pantaneto. With the abolition of the confraternity in 1785, the function for which they had been painted having ceased, the canvases were separated from the heads of the bier and framed in the form of small paintings. The operation was carried out by applying the old arched canvas to new frames, fortunately without damaging the paintings and without intervening with repainting. They were then moved to the upper room of the Palazzo Pubblico (they are still mentioned in the headquarters of the confraternity in the 1784 edition of Giovacchino Faluschi's guide, but are missing from the accurate description of the Company's premises contained in the 1815 edition of the same guide). It is likely that at this time the inscription that can still be read today was placed on the frame. In 1812 Luigi De Angelis saw them in their new location and was able to include «among the works that were to form the nascent art gallery» «certain coffin panels that were in the rooms of the public Palace belonging to our Marco Pino»; the project did not come to fruition, however, and shortly afterwards Romagnoli described them («four small paintings, which have a lot of Vasaresque»), giving their iconography and, with a certain approximation, also their measurements (three-quarters of an arm by more than half an arm, which would actually correspond to 45 x 29.8 cm), in the collection of Dr. Giuseppe Belli, where, he said, they had arrived «no one knows how, at the time of the first Gallic invasion», that is, in the Napoleonic era. Already at that time, the panel with the Conception was no longer with the others. Hidden for two centuries in private collections, the canvases are now in extraordinary conditions of conservation and show intact the quality of the artist's best achievements, where the painting conducted with determination, all first, with supreme ease and speed, marries perfectly with the elaborate elegance of the drawing. They were purchased in 2006 by the Mps Foundation from a private collection. The three paintings bear a brush inscription on the frame, probably from the eighteenth century or early nineteenth century, which says they are “by Marco da Siena”. The ancient attribution can be easily accepted, without any margin of doubt: the dead Christ supported by angels follows the same invention already known for several other examples; the Baptism of Christ is an evolution of the theme already developed by the artist in two Neapolitan panels; even the Sermon of the Baptist, for which no such immediate precedents are known, presents more than one point of contact with the way in which Marco Pino had approached the theme in a secondary episode painted on the background of the large panel with the Baptism, already mentioned, of San Giovanni dei Fiorentini, but also with other known compositions from the artist's maturity. The arched format and the small size are those characteristic of the paintings that decorated the two faces of each head of the 'cataletti' or 'coffins' used for the funeral ceremonies of the confraternities: a typology particularly successful in Siena, in which all the major painters active in the city in the 16th century tried their hand. The textile support, rare for Marco Pino, who generally preferred wood, was adopted here perhaps to facilitate the transport of works that had to travel to reach their destination: we know in fact that the four canvases were executed by the painter in Naples and sent from there to Siena.
Supper at Emmaus (c. 1630)
Blessed Ambrose Sansedoni
Saint Mary Magdalene Reading (c. 1620-1621)
Saint Jerome Penitent (c. 1630)
Madonna with Child and St. John the Baptist
Adoration of the Magi (1734-1736)
Holy Family with Mary Magdalene (1636-37)
Saint Cecilia in the tomb assisted by the Madonna with Child and four angels
Lamentation over the Deposed Christ (c. 1595-1600)
The Blessed Virgin of Ghiara and Saint Francis of Paola
Madonna with Child and St. John the Baptist
The Summer (c. 1644)
Saint Ansanus baptizes a baby girl (c. 1580)
Madonna and Child with Saint Giovannino (1853)
Portrait of Giuseppe Ballati Nerli (1850)
The Two Plinys (1846)
Cain (1842)
Interior of the Siena Cathedral, The Pulpit by Nicola Pisano
Interior of the Siena Cathedral. The Piccolomini Library (1847)
The facade of the Siena Cathedral (1851)
Pia dé Tolomei (1891-92)
Maremma Landscape (1929)
Nativity Scene (1938)
Resurrection of Christ (1890)
Resurrection of Christ (1890)
Frescoed ceiling
The Chapel is dedicated to the memory of Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni (1220-1286) and was founded in 1691, the year in which the renovation work on the ancient tower house began, at the instigation and desire of the knight of Jerusalem Rutilio Sansedoni (1648-1716) who wanted to perpetuate the memory of his illustrious and merciful ancestor. Stylistically, it can be considered the most extraordinary Baroque episode present in Siena. The polychrome aspect chosen by the Medici stonecutters who oversaw the project is certainly particular: among the sumptuous materials, red French marble, Spanish brocatelle, Siena yellow, and Seravezza mischio were used for the columns. The chapel is also characterised by a particular marble altar relief by Giuseppe Mazzuoli (1694). On the side walls are displayed six bronze reliefs (1720) depicting the Life of Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni made by the sculptors Massimiliano Soldani Bensi and Giovan Battista Foggini. The ceiling is frescoed by the Florentine painter Anton Domenico Gabbiani (1697) and represents Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni entrusting the city of Siena to the protection of the Madonna.
Frescoed ceiling
Frescoed ceiling
The bedroom is characterized by the Alcove structure whose arch is surmounted by a large coat of arms of the Order of Malta. Francesco Melani depicted the Nobility (the woman in a toga) coming out of the temple carrying a child to offer him to Minerva, portrayed sitting on the slopes of Parnassus. Next to her, Hercules with the club and the Virtues. In the background, Pegasus drives Apollo's chariot. Bacchus, seated on a rock, is intent on cheering his procession composed of a leopard, two cupids, the maenads and a satyr playing the flute. Continuing, in the corner Apollo is depicted surrounded by the Muses. In the center, Virtuous Love offers laurel wreaths to fame, the cupids hold a standard with the effigy of the Order of Malta and two medallions with the portraits of the mythical ancestors of the Sansedoni family. Finally, the Melani represent the allegory of Envy with a serpent, Time taming Youth and his little geniuses, intent on burning the arrows of Profane Love, the fleeing putto. Eternity closes the scene, with an armilla in her hand.
The "porcelain room"
Frescoed ceiling
Frescoed ceiling
The Roccabruna Room
Room of 19th century works
Stucco room
Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saint Bartholomew, Saint Ansanus and a Donor (1318-20)
Segna di Bonaventura (Siena, news from 1298 to 1327)Tempera and gold on wood, 166x81.5 cm
The altarpiece is one of the most accomplished and stylistically thoughtful works by Segna di Bonaventura, perhaps the highest point of a production of which only a limited number of paintings have reached us; next to our Maestà only that of Castiglion Fiorentino can compete for the elaboration of the scene and the alternation of refined details that recall each other with a wise amalgamation. It is above all the well-constructed architectural framing of the throne that dominates the scene with a well-thought-out understanding of space that confirms a knowledge of the most recent events in the panorama of Sienese pictorial culture in the second decade of the fourteenth century. A long-time close collaborator of Duccio, Segna had the opportunity to approach the production of Simone Martini, which he translated, in his works, into a more nuanced sweetness in the rendering of the faces and into a profound capacity for the luminous interpretation of forms in the modulation of light and dark. There is no other way to explain the subtle expedient of deepening the space by adopting two different intensities of pink in the translation of the pillars of the throne in imitation of marble. more intense, almost an antique pink, on the left, a lighter tone of peach pink on the right, as if the light were settling more intensely, and therefore more vibrantly, on that side. The face of the Virgin herself softens the features in a severity tempered by the lightness of the lineaments; and again the search for a more articulated spatiality, almost as if to overcome the limits imposed by two-dimensionality, transpires from that slightly disheveled widening of the Child's legs which mark, in the trapezium constructed by the movement, a sort of atmospheric expansion around the divine group. The precious decorations in red lacquer, blue and white lead that run along the edge of the blue cloak, as if to imitate silver damascening and enamels, are now fully acquired technical expedients, evoked in not dissimilar forms in the best-known models, such as those adopted for the Maestà by Simone Martini in the Palazzo Pubblico. The convergence of these clues leads to the hypothesis of a date of execution around 1318-20, shortly after Duccio's death.
Saint Lucy (c. 1440)
Sano di Pietro (Siena, 1405 – 1481)Tempera on panel, cm 72×47,8
This delicate image is a fragment of a polyptych and until recently was attributed to the Master of the Osservanza, an anonymous painter under whom a series of paintings of notable quality were collected, datable to the thirties of the fifteenth century and strongly influenced by the art of Sassetta. Among these, the altarpiece dated 1436 of the Osservanza of Siena (the name-piece of the master), the Nativity of the Virgin of Asciano (1437-1439) and the Stories of Saint Anthony the Abbot divided between Berlin, New Haven, New York and Washington stand out. The discovery of some documents has recently revealed what many had already supposed on a stylistic level, that is, that under that name was hidden none other than the young Sano di Pietro, who we know was active since 1428, but of whom we have only documented works from 1444 onwards. Of the grandiose polyptych on two orders, we know the Madonna with Child now in the Lehman collection in New York, the Saint John the Baptist in a private collection in Dallas and two panels with Saint Francis and Saint Ansanus formerly in the De Carlo collection and now divided between Turin and Siena. The young woman depicted, with a rosy complexion and slightly dilated almond-shaped eyes, wears sumptuous clothes and is wrapped in a shimmering and luminous cloak that reveals, together with the refined hairstyle, an attention to the women's fashion of the moment. The colours are calibrated and very bright and while the right hand delicately holds the palm of martyrdom, the left hand weighs the silver basin containing the eyes, symbol of her martyrdom. The saint, in fact, originally from Syracuse and venerated by both the Catholic and Orthodox religions, died during the persecutions of Diocletian, stabbed in the throat. The work is to be counted among the master's most mature works, around 1440, and must have been among the most significant produced in the city at that time. Purchased by the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi in 2008 from Sotheby's in London, until the mid-eighties it was in the Verbught collection in The Hague, having arrived in the Netherlands through the purchase of a private collector. On the back is the sealing wax coat of arms of the barons Sohlen of Sohlenthal.
Saint Jerome (1440)
Matteo di Giovanni (1430-1495)Tempera and gold on wood
Purchased in 2011 from a private Florentine collection, the work is a cuspidate fragment of the large altarpiece of the Sienese church of San Pietro a Ovile that Matteo di Giovanni painted between 1455 and 1464 and which is now exhibited in the Diocesan Museum. The work was fragmented during the nineteenth century when it was still present in the church and is still missing the left cusp. It appears to have belonged to Charles Eliot Norton, professor of Fine Arts at Harvard who stayed in Italy several times between 1850 and 1870 until reappearing in New York in 1990 when it belonged to the Florentine art dealer Piero Corsini. The altarpiece is famous for being a fifteenth-century copy of the Annunciation by Simone Martini and Lippo Memmi from 1333, which is now preserved in the Uffizi Gallery but was originally on the altar of Sant'Ansano in the Siena Cathedral and which, as a typology, was very popular throughout the fifteenth century. The San Girolamo, perfectly preserved in its pictorial surface and gold, has been recognized not only for its style, but also for the perfect correspondence of its carpentry and structural identity with the other two cusps.
Frescoed ceiling
On the ceiling of the new staircase, the Melanis painted the Blessed Ambrose welcoming pilgrims in memory of the blessed who welcomed pilgrims at Porta San Maurizio and led them to his home: the gift of hospitality contrasts with the usury against which the blessed railed in his sermons. Even today, every March 20, in memory of the anniversary of his death, functions are held in his honor and blessed bread is donated.Altarpiece (around 1380)
Francesco di Vannuccio, tempera on panel
The altarpiece, which still preserves intact the relics set in fifteen circular alveoli around the figure of the Madonna of Humility, belonged to the collection of Richard von Kauffmann in Berlin where it was bought in 1917 by the antique dealer AS Drey of Munich and then in order by Camillo Castiglioni in Vienna, again by Drey and then deposited and exhibited in the Closters of the Metropolitan Museum of New York from 1982 to 2009 when it was purchased by the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena at Sotheby's auction in New York in 2010. The artefact, which is noted for its exceptional state of conservation, is made up of two parts that fit together perfectly and whose shaped foot is decorated with pastiglia spirals and three quadrilobes depicting the Imago Pietatis and two mourners. It is attributed to the hand of Francesco di Vannuccio, a painter trained in Siena in the style of Simone Martini and known thanks to the signature on the Crucifixion painted on a processional band dated 1380 and now preserved in the Berlin Gallery. The Child holds in his left hand a scroll with the inscription “Ergo Sum (via veritas e vita) and in his right an olive branch. The work is part of a very particular genre in vogue in the 1340s of reliquary altarpieces in emulation of goldsmith products with the means of painting on wood. The back is painted in fake porphyry.
The altarpiece, which still preserves intact the relics set in fifteen circular alveoli around the figure of the Madonna of Humility, belonged to the collection of Richard von Kauffmann in Berlin where it was bought in 1917 by the antique dealer AS Drey of Munich and then in order by Camillo Castiglioni in Vienna, again by Drey and then deposited and exhibited in the Closters of the Metropolitan Museum of New York from 1982 to 2009 when it was purchased by the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena at Sotheby's auction in New York in 2010. The artefact, which is noted for its exceptional state of conservation, is made up of two parts that fit together perfectly and whose shaped foot is decorated with pastiglia spirals and three quadrilobes depicting the Imago Pietatis and two mourners. It is attributed to the hand of Francesco di Vannuccio, a painter trained in Siena in the style of Simone Martini and known thanks to the signature on the Crucifixion painted on a processional band dated 1380 and now preserved in the Berlin Gallery. The Child holds in his left hand a scroll with the inscription “Ergo Sum (via veritas e vita) and in his right an olive branch. The work is part of a very particular genre in vogue in the 1340s of reliquary altarpieces in emulation of goldsmith products with the means of painting on wood. The back is painted in fake porphyry.
Madonna and Child with Saints John the Baptist, Catherine, Lucy and John the Evangelist
Priamo della Quercia (Lucca? c. 1400 - Volterra? c. 1468)Tempera and gold on panel, 101 x 55 cm. with frame
Painted surface 70.5 x 41 cm.
The painting was purchased by the Mps Foundation in 2006 from a private Florentine collection. Easily recognizable as a work by the painter Priamo della Quercia, brother of the great sculptor Jacopo and active between Lucca, Sarzana, San Miniato, Siena and Volterra. The panel depicts the Virgin seated on an architectural throne with wings, conceived with some perspective ambition and resting on a platform covered with a rich carpet. On her knees sits Baby Jesus whose pink dress opens to his nudity to emphasize, as often happened, especially in the sculpted reliefs of the fifteenth century, his having become a man. This main sacred group is surrounded by four saints of uncertain spatial placement, depicted on a smaller scale to highlight their lesser hierarchical importance compared to the Madonna and Jesus. Some, such as Saint John the Baptist, Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Lucy, towards whom the little Jesus is leaning, are easily recognisable thanks to the presence of their most typical attributes (the camel skin for the Baptist, the eyes resting on a small tray which recall his martyrdom and name, for Lucy, and the youthful appearance and the book for the Evangelist), while as regards the saint at the top left, richly dressed, with a book and a small crown which stands out on her complex hairdo, her identification with Catherine of Alexandria or Ursula remains uncertain. Also worthy of note is the depiction of the Child, who, in order to turn towards Saint Lucia and at the same time touch the hand of the Mother, crosses his arms on his chest, assuming a very unnatural pose and rather rare in the painting of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, probably evocative of the predestination to martyrdom on the Cross. The painting here under examination belongs to the artist's youthful activity, carried out in Lucca and in Sarzana, where some of his works recognized by critics on the basis of Balduccio's style remain, in the church of San Francesco in Sarzana. The structure of the panel also falls within a very common typology in the pictorial production of the fifteenth century and frequent in the work of Priamo. In fact, we know of at least two other panels of similar composition painted by Priamo: the Madonna and Child between Saints John the Evangelist and Barbara, formerly in the Fischer Gallery in Lucerne and the Madonna and Child between Saints Jacopo and Vittore (1450) in the Pinacoteca Comunale in Volterra.
Adoration of the Shepherds (c. 1493)
Pietro di Francesco degli Orioli (1458 - 1496)Tempera on panel, 66.5 x 49.5 cm.
The painting faithfully represents a passage from the Gospel of Luke (2.8-20) where the birth of Jesus is described, the narration of which begins from the right side of the upper part of the painting, where we see the apparition of the angel to the two shepherds who then head with a certain haste to the foot of the mountain where, inside a stable, the event is taking place. At the centre of the composition the child, lying in a cradle made with the hollow of the packsaddle taken from the donkey and stuffed with hay, seems to have just been awakened by the arrival of the two adoring shepherds while all the other characters seem to kneel before him. The Itinere ends with the two shepherds who, mounted on horseback, go along the white road on the left, towards the walls of Jerusalem to spread the word towards a marshy landscape in the background, where the view is lost. The master, who was active in Siena in the last two decades of the fifteenth century, trained in the workshop of Matteo di Giovanni and later in that of Francesco di Giorgio through which he was able to acquire certain artistic innovations more foreign to the narrow Sienese environment such as the culture of perspective and the treatment of light. These two aspects characterize this composition which is well articulated on a spatial level demonstrating a certain knowledge of the culture of Urbino and of certain precious luministic qualities of Flemish origin pondered through Domenico Ghirlandaio.
The painting was born as a devotional image to be placed on an altar or above the bed of a private individual. It belonged until 1807 to Charles Kinnaird at his English castle in Perthshire and then passed on the antiques market until arriving in 2006 in the collection of the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena.
Reclining Venus with Two Cupids (c. 1510-12)
Domenico Beccafumi (Siena 1484-1551)Oil on panel, 73×57.3 cm
The painting, which appeared on the antiques market between 1967 and 1976 and comes from a private collection in Budapest, is the fragmentary part of a larger composition that must have been a decorative piece of furniture, most likely the back of a bed. This is confirmed by the measurements of similar objects that saw widespread production and diffusion in Siena in patrician homes from the early sixteenth century until the middle of the century by artists and craftsmen of the time. In the panels preserved today, as in the examples of the Chigi Saracini Collection in Siena, the image of a reclining female figure is repeated several times, painted in panels of about 150 cm. in length, which correspond exactly to a third of our panel; one must therefore think of a resection of the wooden support to obtain only the initial part of the female bust with two cupids, eliminating the remaining two thirds either for conservation reasons or simply for a change in taste and the original use of the work, now reduced to a wall painting. The subject depicted, a reclining female figure, is to be identified with a Venus, as demonstrated by the attributes associated with her: the myrtle branch, a plant sacred to the goddess, which she holds in her right hand and the helmet placed on the ground, alluding to Mars, on which her arm rests; a subject replicated several times in similar furnishing elements, and with few variations for the patrician homes of Siena. The woman's absorbed face, shaded by nuances still reminiscent of Leonardo, stands out from the putti characterized by sunken profiles, broad foreheads, stretched and ambiguous smiles, with their heads covered by a dense intertwining of blond curls. An undeniable compactness of elements that lead to placing the work around 1510-1512. Without a doubt the typology of the object and its iconography constituted the reference models for a wide series of derivations, whose fortune arrived at least in the mid-sixteenth century.
Although it has reached us in an imperfect state of conservation, the panel reveals all the charm of a representation attentive to the underlining of refined details: observe the pearls of red lacquer that formed the thin profile of a transparent veil that has now almost disappeared; the shiny glow that illuminates the metal helmet, the liquid application of the lacquer that outlines iridescent effects on the silk cloth spread on the ground, in shades of red. The painting is spread in an extremely loose manner, with rapid brush strokes on a surface almost devoid of preparation and in densities of colour that clump together in the description of the leaves in a bright green. The speed of execution certainly had to correspond to the nature of an object intended for home decoration and as such created with great freedom of stroke.
Holy Family with an Angel (c. 1525)
Andrea del Brescianino (documented in Siena from 1506 to 1524, in Florence from 1525)Oil on panel, 87.5×65 cm
The provenance of the work is unknown, purchased by the Mps Foundation from the Parisian antiques market in 2005. It is certainly one of the painter's most successful works for the elegance of the composition, chromatic harmony, and expressive intensity of the figures. The painting dates back to the last period of Brescianino's Sienese activity, attracted by the manners of Andrea del Sarto, a detail confirmed by the contiguity of era and style: the rarefied atmosphere in which the narration is immersed, the use of almost theatrical chiaroscuro, to underline the divine group, illuminated as if by an intense light source that instead leaves the two supporting figures of Saint Joseph and the angel in the shadows. It is one of the painter's most successful works for the chromatic harmony and expressive intensity of the figures typical of the last phase of his stay in Sienese, before moving to Florence where it is attested in 1525.
Madonna of the Veil (c. 1520)
Andrea del Brescianino (documented in Siena from 1506 to 1524, in Florence from 1525)Oil on panel transferred to canvas, cm 109×89.4
There is little information about the painting before 2008 when it appeared at auction at Christie's and was then purchased in 2009 by the Mps Foundation. Before that, it had been attested since 1932 in the London collection of Harry Harris where it was also reported by Bernard Berenson who attributed it to Andrea del Brescianino, an early sixteenth-century Mannerist master active between Siena in the 1520s where he would appear to be active in Beccafumi's workshop and Florence where he is attested in 1525. The setting of the scene reveals clear Raphaelesque influences filtered through Florentine knowledge. It is a Madonna del Veil: Mary lifts a transparent veil to reveal her sleeping son, prefiguring his tragic fate. The subject enjoyed great success and it seems that the most palpable reference must be traced back to two widely reproduced models, namely the Madonna del Veil of Chantilly and the Madonna del diadema of the Louvre, works by Raphael. The painting was probably in poor condition when it was decided to remove it from its original wood support and transfer it to canvas, an operation that was probably carried out at the beginning of the 20th century with good results.
Cleopatra (c. 1570)
Marco Pino (Siena, 1521 – Naples, 1583)Oil on panel, cm. 110×195
The painting, purchased by the Mps Foundation on the antiques market in 2005, belongs to the hand of Marco Pino, a Sienese painter who was very active in the mid-16th century between Siena, Rome and Naples, being a direct pupil of Domenico di Pace known as “il Beccafumi”, the leading exponent of Sienese Mannerism. A collaborator of Perin del Vaga and Daniele da Volterra, the artist shows that he had learned Michelangelo's lessons well and was a valid representative of the Neapolitan Counter-Reformation. Cleopatra is depicted naked, lying on a purple-red cloak against a landscape background, her bust resting on a brocade cushion, with the symbols of her royal condition, the sceptre and the crown, clearly visible, while she is bitten on the breast by the asp that has wrapped itself around her arm; some figs scattered on the ground allude to the basket of fruit in which the snake had been hidden. It is not a usual way of depicting the ancient queen of Egypt, who died in her palace, attended by her maids, according to the story of Plutarch, and other classical sources: the artist's intent is evidently not the 'history painting' but rather that of creating an image with a strong erotic content and an erudite and playful variation on the theme of the sensual 'nudes with landscape', characteristic above all of the Venetian tradition. There are very few known precedents in this sense: in Roman antiquity the queen of Egypt had been seen above all as Horace's «fatale monstrum», the threat brought to Rome and to Augustus the peacemaker with immodesty, seduction and corruption, a strongly negative character, to whom only the strength of spirit demonstrated in facing death and avoiding the humiliation of imprisonment could bring a partial redemption in extremis. The negative image of the lustful queen had substantially remained in the medieval imagination, from Dante to Boccaccio, and it was only in the freer and more tolerant climate of the early sixteenth century that we gradually witness a change of direction, an emphasis on the tragic destiny of women, who even began to be included in the series of heroines of history, alongside women of exemplary morality, such as Lucrezia, Porzia and Sofonisba, on the other hand on the erotic potential of her figure, so that from the beginning of the sixteenth century the character began to take on a different dimension, initially rather ambiguous: a memorable example at least for one sure virtue, the firmness of spirit, but at the same time a titillating image of sensuality that became more and more explicitly erotic over the course of the century. It is only from then on that Cleopatra begins to be represented with a certain frequency in painting as an isolated figure, always depicted in the 'heroic' moment of suicide, of which the iconography is affirmed - not justified by ancient sources - of the exposed naked body and the bite on the uncovered breast, which adds to the erotic charge of the naked body the thrill of Thanatos, and which will have a long fortune in the following centuries.
Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine of Siena (c. 1600)
Francesco Vanni (1564-1610)oil on canvas, cm 99×74
The painting, from a private collection from which it was purchased in 2005, illustrates an iconographic theme dear to the devotion of the Sienese, namely the Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine of Siena. In representing the Saint, always dressed in the white robe of the Dominican tertiaries, it is important to note how the endowment of symbols of her mystical relationship with Christ is varied, especially with regard to the much-lived controversy over the visible stigmata represented here only through a reddish wound on the left hand.
The relationship between the altarpiece painted in 1601 for the Church of San Raimondo Refugio with the same theme and the new canvas is also close in terms of style. The two works agree in terms of human typologies, chromatic choices and the marked accentuation of chiaroscuro. It is a truly happy moment in the master's career, as demonstrated by the beautiful compositional inventions and the high pictorial quality of both these altarpieces and the painting under examination, in which the witty sweetness of the little Jesus is particularly fascinating, whose gentle and red face clearly descends from illustrious models of early sixteenth-century Parma painting (Correggio and Parmigianino), who were an essential part of Vanni's cultural heritage, right from his first pictorial experiences. The essential landscape view painted in the background is also appreciable, for how it evokes a stormy night crossed by dazzling electric flashes.
Three dancing cupids, in the act of offering fruit
Domenico Cafaggi (Florence, 1530 – Siena, 1608)Carved and painted wood, 55 cm height
Purchased from a private collection in 2004, the three little angels, dancers and jugglers, dance in airy poses, suspended in virtuous balance on small cirrus clouds as if they were the spheres of a circus game, elegantly offering a pear, a bunch of grapes and a pomegranate and perhaps intended for the decoration of a wedding chest or a bed as allusions to the fertility and wealth of the spouses' family. As underlined by Giancarlo Gentilini, who attributed them to Domenico Cafaggi, the little angels declare the full participation of their author in the imaginative, refined, virtuosic climate of 'international mannerism', probably in the years between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as suggested by the open and dynamic movements already inclined to the formal research of baroque sculpture. Furthermore, some peculiar features, expression of a very original and eccentric spirit, the typological variety of the heads, two of which are characterised by a bizarre physiognomy that echoes pictorial models by Beccafumi, while the other, more classical and graceful, reveals memories of Donatello such as the Dancing Angels on the crowning of the baptismal font of the Baptistery of Siena, lead us into Sienese territory, demonstrating a close relationship with some painted wooden sculptures traditionally attributed to Lorenzo di Mariano known as Marrina.
Ancient scene (Selene and Endymion?)
Marco Pino (Siena, 1521 – Naples, 1583)Oil on panel, cm 80x140
The painting by Marco Pino, purchased by the Mps Foundation in 2004 on the antiques market, represents a subject that is not immediately recognizable. A certain underlying ambiguity remains even if the most reliable hypothesis seems to identify in the panel an image of the myth of Endymion. This is a theme that is not foreign to Sienese culture; indeed, considering the not very high frequency of mythological subjects, significant occurrences can be indicated starting from the panel on the ceiling of the Piccolomini Library and from the depictions by Giorgio di Giovanni in the Chigi Saracini collection and in the Loggia of the villa of Belcaro. Baldassarre Peruzzi at the Farnesina, in the Sala delle Prospettive, also represented the same subject according to a tradition that dates back to Förster. The two main figures on the left, immersed in the moonlit night atmosphere, could, at first glance, recall the Virgilian episode of Euryalus and Nisus with the camp in the background on the opposite side. Upon closer inspection, the reclining figure bears no wounds and seems to be in a deep sleep. As for the other figure above, beyond some masculine elements, it seems directly connected to the chariot of the Moon and, on the basis of the various elements (hairstyle, hand gesture, etc.), one can discern in it a representation of Selene (or the Moon herself). A study of the literary sources and the iconographic tradition is required to acquire some sufficiently well-founded reasons to support the identification of the subject. Endymion, a mythical shepherd linked to the foundation of Elis and, according to other witnesses, to the region of Caria, is endowed with extraordinary beauty. Selene falls madly in love with him, according to a tradition widely attested in ancient literature and which seems to date back for the first time to Sappho. According to some sources, Zeus, Endymion's real father, grants him what he desires: to sleep forever without aging or dying. Selene, burning with love, descends from her chariot and goes to find Endymion immersed in eternal sleep and this aspect of the legend becomes characteristic of representations in ancient art. In this insatiable passion, the Moon is compared by poets with the figure of Medea who leaves her house at night and heads to the camp where Jason is.
Supper at Emmaus (c. 1630)
Rutilio Manetti (1571-1639)oil on canvas, 144 × 207 cm.
The work was purchased by the MPS Foundation in 2007 at a Sotheby's auction in London.
The scene illustrates the evangelical episode of the supper at Emmaus, during which Jesus Christ in the guise of a pilgrim is recognised by his two travelling companions, at the moment of the blessing of the bread (Luke, 24, 30).
The grandiose layout suggested by the size of the figures and the two monumental columns in the background refers to the classicist style of history painting; the composed and devoted figure of Christ seems in line with much Florentine painting of the time and almost preludes a sacred image by Carlo Dolci; the horizontal cut of the scene respects the canon established, on the conditioned models of Caravaggio, by Bartolomeo Manfredi (the so-called «manfrediana methodus»).
The extraordinary naturalistic quality of the whole proves how the painter remained faithful to the most sincere models of Caravaggio-style painting, which had such widespread diffusion and power of radiation from the Roman artistic environment between the second and third decades of the seventeenth century. It is with works of particular qualitative quality such as this Supper at Emmaus and all the related ones that Manetti managed to keep alive a painting of strong naturalistic temper, while in the variegated Roman artistic center of the thirties the trends of Bolognese classicism and the nascent Baroque of Pietro da Cortona were rather consolidating. The work is framed by a beautiful contemporary black frame with gold trim.
Blessed Ambrose Sansedoni
Raffaello Vannioil on canvas, 110 × 80 cm.
The painting was purchased on the antiques market in 2001 and represents the first purchase of the collection of the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena. Attributed to Raffaello Vanni, it depicts the Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni with the classic iconographic attributes. His eyes raised to the sky, pathetically moistened to confirm the intensity of his feelings of affection towards his city, the religious man is dressed in the Dominican habit and holds in his hands the model of Siena as it must have been in the middle of the century, embellished with the Sansedoni coat of arms. The coat of arms of the Blessed, in addition to suggesting his identity, perhaps demonstrates his ownership and therefore his original location towards some room owned by the Sansedoni family. Initially attributed to his father Francesco, to whom it does not demonstrate the formal and chromatic characteristics, the painting belongs to a later period, around the middle of the 17th century.
Saint Mary Magdalene Reading (c. 1620-1621)
Rutilio Manetti (Siena 1571-1639)Oil on canvas, 110×85.5 cm
The painting, clearly in line with Caravaggio's naturalism, was executed by Rutilio Manetti around the 1620s when, having undergone a clear stylistic transformation, he adapted to the new lighting solutions proposed by the Lombard master.
The painter, considered one of the greatest Tuscan painters of the early 17th century, was influenced by Caravaggio's painting, inevitably acting as a channel for the diffusion of this style in the Sienese land. The Saint is depicted inside a dark cave while, completely absorbed, she is meditating on a sacred text. The positions of the arms, one supporting the head and the other encircling the book, highlight a state of meditation from which the saint is completely enraptured. The light descends from above through a luminous beam that highlights the girl's body, her diaphanous skin, the red cloak. The skull on the left that appears as a memento mori of extraordinary crudeness is created with clarity and excellent pictorial rendering in the intercession of the complex shapes of the cranial structure and its cavities. The dark background highlights the warm colours and vibrant tones and underlines the chaste and serious representation of the penitent covered only by her cloak and thick, long hair. The painting was probably made for Cardinal Del Taja, to whose family it belonged until its recent sale in 2005. This justifies its elegant contemporary frame and the calm tone of the composition, which in other cases is approached in a more sensual way.
Saint Jerome Penitent (c. 1630)
Rutilio Manetti (Siena 1571-1639)Oil on canvas, cm 120×89
Made by the Sienese painter in his mature age, this painting depicts Saint Jerome the penitent. The extremely popular saint is surrounded by numerous stacked volumes and his iconographic attributes: the stone and the skull. The setting is not easily recognizable, we are probably outside a cave where the character in question is absorbed in meditation. The face, disfigured by pain and wrinkles, is turned upwards, as if he were in conversation with a divine entity from whom he is asking forgiveness. The skull, symbol of penitence and memento mori is depicted with lucid realism while the stone held in the right hand, with which he has just struck his chest, perhaps implies a self-punishment he has just inflicted. The books imply that Jerome, Doctor of the Church and famous Latinist, was a famous translator and his studies include the Vulgate, the first complete translation of the Bible into Latin, the translation of the Gospels and the Old Testament into Hebrew. The painting contains all of Caravaggio's predilections: the brilliant crimson red cloak that envelops the saint and illuminates the left part of the painting, the threadlike brushstrokes of light in the hair, in the furrows of the wrinkles and on the tips of the fingers, the natural crudeness of the expression. The Monte dei Paschi Foundation purchased the work in 2008 from a private collection.
Madonna with Child and St. John the Baptist
Giuseppe Mazzuoli (1644-1725)gilded bronze, cm 29,5×38,2
The work was purchased on the antiques market in 2008 but its patron and use are unknown. The flourishing maternal figure of the Madonna is depicted in the act of giving the breast to the Child who lies stretched out in her arms, while Saint John, with a smile on his lips, observes the pleasant and intimate scene. The heavy cloak, a precious flowered brocade that envelops the three figures, creates a protective casket and, at the same time, echoes the oblique oval of the bronze plaque.
A very similar marble version of this composition is known in Münster in a private collection. However, it is sculpted in a considerably larger format (54.5 x 63 cm) and the oval is slightly less flattened. The Madonna offers the Child her naked breast, while in the bronze plaque the breast, despite being well highlighted, remains covered by the light fabric of the dress. The cloak of the marble, bordered with braid, is without a pattern. The young Saint John is missing the staff of the cross that makes him recognizable as the future Baptist. We must assume that the starting point for both versions was a relief modeled in terracotta (presumably in the small format of the bronze plaque). Giuseppe Mazzuoli constantly produced artefacts of this type but the material in which Giuseppe most recognized himself was undoubtedly marble in fact our work is certainly an anomaly in the corpus of works by Giuseppe Mazzuoli. There is no evidence to suggest that he ever formed a partnership with a skilled foundryman to increase his artistic production in this field. He always remained exclusively a sculptor. The work is therefore of considerable interest for its uniqueness and singularity.
Adoration of the Magi (1734-1736)
Giuseppe Nicola Nasini (1657-1736)Oil on canvas, 32 x 64 cm.
The painting, of small dimensions, is in all probability the design idea for a composition of greater scope attributed to the hand of Giuseppe Nicola Nasini. In the search for a probable realization of the subject, one can tangibly feel the close relationship between the figuration on canvas and the large scene depicted on the right wall of the Church of San Niccolò in Maggiano, the last undertaking carried out by Giuseppe Nicola in collaboration with his son Apollonio, begun in 1734 and completed by the latter upon his father's death in 1736. Each element harks back to that phase in the activity of the Nasini 'workshop', in which the baroque experiments, widely practiced during the painter's long career, veer towards a pictorial conception even more open to pre-Rococo solutions. Some references to a mannered Cortonism now seem to have been overcome, strengthened and darkened in the colors by the considered and often re-proposed influence of Luca Giordano (known at the time of the Florentine period in the decoration of Palazzo Medici Riccardi). The painting presents a compositional and chromatic balance of great charm, presented with a lightness of structure and a search for brightness that pervade the representation. Almost all the theatrical devices are proposed, in search of an exuberant narrative rhythm, which is repeated, albeit with some variation between the large and small format of the sketch.
It was purchased in 2007.
Holy Family with Mary Magdalene (1636-37)
Bernardino Mei (1612-1676)Oil on canvas, cm 100×122
The work was purchased by the Mps Foundation in 2006 from a private collection.
It has been attributed to Bernardino Mei by Alessandro Bagnoli who also dates it to the beginning of the fifth decade of the seventeenth century. The subject is faithful to the principles of the most sincere Caravaggio-style painting, the scene being imagined in terms of daily domestic intimacy and without obvious signs of the sanctity of the characters. However, the sacredness of the figuration does not escape, taking into account that the relaxation of the body of the sleeping Child invincibly recalls the mortal abandonment of the pious Christ in the arms of his mother; while the young woman who tenderly kisses the foot of the little Jesus has her hair loose, as is typical of the Magdalene when she manifests her sorrowful devotion on the body of the dead Christ.
Saint Cecilia in the tomb assisted by the Madonna with Child and four angels
Ventura Salimbeni, (Siena, 1568-1613)Oil on copper, 26.8x38.7 cm
The small painting on copper, before appearing at the Christie's auction on 8 July 2008, where it was purchased, belonged to the collection of the former director of the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, Michael Jaffé. The work represents the contemplation of the Madonna and Child of the body of Saint Cecilia, who on her neck shows the wounds mortally inflicted by the executioner, lying under the tomb slab, as it was found in the basement of the church bearing her name in 1599. Two of the four rejoicing angels in them carry crowns of flowers (one is placed on the tomb floor), while a third holds and plays a portative organ, a typical instrument in the iconography of the saint, while a fourth lifts the transparent veil that hid the body of the martyr in the tomb.
The tenderness of the putti's flesh, the effects of light and the iridescence on the clothes of the female protagonists of the work, with their folds of a papery consistency, undoubtedly recall Barocci's models, to which Ventura, like Francesco Vanni and Alessandro Casolani, had certainly turned their attention in the formative years of art, as well as a significant recovery of the methods of Sienese painting of the early sixteenth century, in particular of some of Beccafumi's chromatic audacities.
The tenderness of the putti's flesh, the effects of light and the iridescence on the clothes of the female protagonists of the work, with their folds of a papery consistency, undoubtedly recall Barocci's models, to which Ventura, like Francesco Vanni and Alessandro Casolani, had certainly turned their attention in the formative years of art, as well as a significant recovery of the methods of Sienese painting of the early sixteenth century, in particular of some of Beccafumi's chromatic audacities.
Lamentation over the Deposed Christ (c. 1595-1600)
Francesco Vanni (1564-1610)Oil on canvas, cm. 65×54
Purchased from a private collection in 2005, the painting has an unknown provenance and seems to have been executed, given its small size, for a private client, perhaps for the altar of a family chapel. The scene, taken from the Gospels, portrays the moment following the descent of Christ from the cross, when Joseph of Arimathea, having removed the nails and the crown of thorns and wrapped Jesus in a shroud, carries him before the tomb, leaving him in the company of Mary and Magdalene. Christ appears gently leaning on his mother's knees supported by another woman who embraces him, caressing his hair. The Virgin with half-closed eyes is absorbed in prayer, while the young saint looks lostly towards the observer, with her eyes veiled with tears, as if seeking commiseration. Christ's proportions appear all too measured for a man over thirty; he is delicately approached by his mother as if to relive the filial love of a child. The scene is made even more dramatic by the leaden sky at dusk, barely lit by a few golden brushstrokes, while the clothes are painted with primary colors, well defined, which flake in the facets of the folds. The painting reveals the mature hand of Francesco Vanni : one of the protagonists of the Sienese artistic scene between the last decades of the sixteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth century. This scene populated by a few characters and so in keeping, in its intimacy, with the spirit of the Counter-Reformation is now far from dramatic and powerful compositions, such as the beautiful Christ on the road to Calvary in the Sienese church of Santi Quirico e Giulitta (1593-95): a painting in which the statuesque and imposing bodies of the protagonists are constructed through a cold chromatic range. In our Lamentation, the affected somatic features of the full and half-open mouths, of the diaphanous ivory-coloured skin and of the dark but brilliant eyes, instead refer to the sensitivity of Bolognese painting, testifying how Francesco Vanni, over the years, had been able to evolve from the refined late eclecticism Mannerist of his youthful works, towards a more defined style, updated on the results of early seventeenth-century painting.
The Blessed Virgin of Ghiara and Saint Francis of Paola
Rutilio Manetti (Siena, 1571/1639)Oil on canvas, 36.5 x 32 cm
The canvas, preserved in an ancient lacquered frame, was purchased by the MPS Foundation in 2006; it comes from a private collection. It is a typical example of a painting intended for private devotion, for which both the request of the client and the contribution of the painter will have contributed to establishing the iconography, to a degree that is difficult to evaluate in detail today. The formal solution of the Madonna seated with her hands clasped in front of the Child immediately catches the eye, which derives strictly from an invention by Lelio Orsi (Novellara, 1508/15111587), known from a drawing of 1569, now preserved in the Museum of the Beata Vergine della Ghiara in Reggio Emilia. In 1573 this drawing served the painter Giovanni de' Bianchi, known as Bertone, to reproduce that sacred image in a fresco in a roadside tabernacle on a wall of the Servite convent near Reggio Emilia. This representation soon acquired great fortune in the religious sphere, following the miracle that occurred to a young deaf-mute who in 1596, praying in front of that fresco, obtained the ability to speak. Thanks to this fact, the image of that Madonna, who in the local cult will take the name of Blessed Virgin of Ghiara, was immediately spread through pictorial derivations and prints. The work is attributed by Alessandro Bagnoli to the hand of Rutilio Manetti around 1610 when he was still very influenced by the manner of Francesco Vanni especially in the choice of a range of cold, acidulous and intense colors.
Madonna with Child and St. John the Baptist
Giovanni Berti (Montalcino, 16th century)Carrara marble, 47 x 65 cm
Signed and dated: «IO BERTIUS ILCINENSIS SCALPEBAT MDLXX»
The marble oval, whose provenance and use are unknown, was purchased by the MPS Foundation in 2005 from private individuals. The discovery of the work arouses keen interest in its author, the Chinese sculptor whose only known statue until now was that of Cosimo I de' Medici, signed and dated 1564, now in the loggia beneath the Palazzo Comunale in Montalcino. Recalling that statue, the nineteenth-century scholar Ettore Romagnoli states that Berti was very active in Rome as a restorer of works of antiquity. The Virgin, humbly seated on the ground, on a sort of rock with various facets and lightly lined surfaces, holds a book in her right hand, perhaps the Gospel, closed against her index finger, to suggest a specific passage, or a reading suddenly interrupted; she protectively embraces the naked Child, even though she turns her gaze to the opposite side to the arrival of the child Saint John the Baptist, the precursor of Christ. In an excellent state of preservation, the marble appears decidedly influenced by Michelangelo's style, both for the complexion of the female figure dressed in ample drapery, posed according to the rule of 'contrapposto', and for the strongly classicizing features of the face, of a Roman matron. Similar to an oval-shaped cameo with an ivory patina, it still shows traces of the original gilding in various areas. Along the edge, under the figure of the Virgin, in Roman capitals, is inserted the signature of the author and the date 1570.
The Summer (c. 1644)
Astolfo Petrazzi (1580-1635)Oil on canvas, cm. 95.4×158.6
The painting depicting Summer is part of a cycle having the seasons as its theme and, probably, together with other canvases already known in private collections, depicting Winter and Spring, comes from the Chigiana villa of Volte. It was purchased in 2008.
The artistic activity of Petrazzi is characterized by a multiplicity of subjects and intentions: for the public destination the large altarpieces with religious subjects and for the private one the still lifes and musical subjects. The painter seems to be at the center of a large atelier frequented by young people, even foreigners, among whom stood out the one who would later become the greatest specialist of the battle genre, namely Jacques Courtois, known as 'the Burgundian' and who brought together an unidentified series of artists specialized in creating still lifes.
Taking our example as an example, it seems quite clear that we are faced with a painting executed by at least two hands. The girl leaning on the left corner of the painting and who, together with her iconographic attributes, represents the personification of Summer, holds a sheaf of wheat ears and is resting in the shade of an oak tree of which an oak branch can be glimpsed at the top. These two details are probably intended to remind the viewer of a good omen for the client: an abundance of crops (sheaf of wheat) for the Chigi family (oak shoots). The girl's features unquestionably belong to the hand of Petrazzi: a certain plastic immobility, subdued colours, gathered hair and they bring to mind the Lute Player in the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Siena, datable to the beginning of the second decade of the seventeenth century when the painter appears perfectly suited to naturalistic experiences. The right part of the painting, instead, characterized by a wide-ranging still life study, reveals extraordinary flashes: from the shadows appear, as if illuminated by beams of light, an old-fashioned vase with brightly colored flowers and variegated shapes, a basket with fruit, vegetables and leaves with warm and well-calibrated colors. The vases of flowers, in addition to showing a naturalistic interest, constitute the symbolic content of the work. The flowers, precisely because they are short-lived, best express the fleeting and transitory nature of human life. The two parts of the painting, so different from each other, are united by a background with a country view where a putto looks out playing the flute. The building in the distance actually resembles the Chigiano complex not far from Siena characterized by a rectangular villa, a wall surrounding it and a fish pond. The young putto with red cheeks seems to invite the viewer to visit the place.
Still life is a genre inaugurated by Flemish painters at the end of the sixteenth century, and in Italy it finds its greatest representative in Caravaggio. Initially, this subject is appreciated by few: the term itself, «morta», introduced in the Academies, has an evidently derogatory meaning. In less than half a century, however, the genre becomes very popular for the homes of nobles and bourgeois and Siena also adapts quite quickly to this new genre. Petrazzi's still lifes are essentially influenced by the Tuscan models of Jacopo da Empoli and the Roman Caravaggesque prototypes of Tommaso Salini and Pietro Paolo Bonzi known as the Gobbo dei Carracci. In this group of artists, active in Rome between the second and fourth decades of the seventeenth century, the Master of the Acquavella still life stands out, who critics identify with Bartolomeo Cavarozzi, an artist who specializes in the production of paintings depicting baskets laden with fruit, ripe pumpkins, cabbages and bunches of grapes. This type of representation was practiced since the first decade of the seventeenth century in the Academy established in the Roman Palace of Giovan Battista Crescenzi where naturalistic painting sessions took place and it is probably in this environment that Astolfo Petrazzi discovered this new genre which was later much appreciated in Siena.
Saint Ansanus baptizes a baby girl (c. 1580)
Vincenzo Rustici (Siena 1557-1632)Oil on canvas, 99.5×99.5 cm
The painting, purchased in 2007, is inside an antique black lacquered frame with gilded carvings. It is in good condition.
The subject represented is a mixture of sacred representation, with a strong symbolic character for the Sienese, and a probable representation of a news item, the details of which are unknown, given the unknown location of the painting and the reasons for its commission.
The young Saint on the right, who carries the Balzana (the black and white flag emblem of Siena), is easily identifiable with Ansanus, whom hagiographic tradition remembers as the first evangelizer and baptizer of the Sienese, at the beginning of the 4th century.
A consolidated iconography depicts the young Roman martyr while baptizing some Sienese: think for example of the large altarpiece painted by Francesco Vanni for the Cathedral of Siena in 1596. In the painting here under examination, the patron saint of Siena is, in fact, imparting the first sacrament to a little girl covered in a white dress, as befits a catechumen, and who wears on her head a cap and a wreath of tiny and simple wild flowers. Next to the tender protagonist of the painting, a child - who one would say is the twin, so similar is he in features and age shown
whose back a man looks at the group below him. Everything suggests that an entire family is depicted, while devoutly attending the baptism of their little daughter, which is taking place in a place easily identifiable for the Sienese. The scene in the foreground is, in fact, set in the small square in front of the ancient church
di Sant'Ansano in Castelvecchio, which is recognizable by its structure, the door canopy and the glass oculus above. The ancient Porta Aurea, now destroyed, can also be recognized in the background.
The fact that even Saint Ansanus was mentioned leads one to think that the baptism episode could be a sort of votive representation, which a Sienese family wanted to have painted in memory of a miraculous event, which should have involved the little girl and the Saint invoked for help. The fashionable clothes and in particular those of the child, with the stiff lettuce around the neck, the elegant yellow jacket and the puffy white-striped breeches, indicate a dating that cannot be later than the 1580s.
Madonna and Child with Saint Giovannino (1853)
Luigi Mussini (1813-1888)oil on canvas, cm 96×96
The painting was purchased by the Mps Foundation in 2007; it is dated and signed 1853. The commission was by the Sienese marquise Maria Ballati Nerli and upon the death of the noblewoman (1860) it was inherited by the Palmieri Nuti family by testamentary bequest. The preparatory cartoon for this canvas is known and is part of the collection of the Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena.
The painting, conceived during Mussini's stay in Paris, was certainly finished in Siena in 1853, in a stylistic juncture of closeness to Jean Dominique Ingres and European academicism. The derivation from the great Renaissance painters reconsidered at the methodological level is clear for the clarity of forms, the chromatic harmony, the pyramidal setting of the scene.
Portrait of Giuseppe Ballati Nerli (1850)
Luigi Mussini (Berlin 1813-Siena 1888)Oil on canvas, cm 118×89
The painting depicts a young man with a noble and calm gaze, smooth brown hair parted and curled over his broad forehead, a thick, well-ordered beard, depicted standing, three-quarter length, almost life-size and almost full-length, dressed in dark clothes, a white shirt with a raised collar and wrapped in a black silk bow, his left hand hidden in his grey-checked waistcoat on which hangs and shines, at the bottom, a gold chain with a carnelian seal attached. The man delicately rests his right hand on the corner of a walnut desk, with moldings, a dentil motif and a neo-sixteenth-century carving on the front. Above it stand two leather-bound volumes, with gold decorations on the spine and the title «History of Italy», certainly an allusion to a patriotic ideal. It is the interior of a grey and unadorned studio that welcomes him, with the walls just enlivened by the geometric pattern of the stucco squares on cleverly staggered planes, to suggest depth. Certainly made in Paris in 1850, the painting shows a style that is markedly Ingresian. Both for the compositional cut, for the quality of the drawing, and for the considered gradation of light, the artist seems to keep in mind the most recent portrait production of the great French painter. It is one of the various portraits, in oil and watercolour, that Mussini found himself dealing with during that period of French residence interrupted by the call to the Institute of Fine Arts in Siena, in October 1851. A portrait therefore made from memory, which the painter also refers to in a letter to Giovanni Duprè from Paris, on 27 October 1849: «I have sketched the replica of the Musica Sacra and I am sketching the aforementioned painting on the studies made on site. Then I will take care of an oil portrait of poor Beppe Nerli that I promised to try to his poor Mother". It was purchased by a private collector in 2007.
The Two Plinys (1846)
Luigi Mussini (1813-1888)Oil on canvas, cm. 61×80
The painting was purchased by the Mps Foundation in 2006 on the antique market. It is dated and signed 1846.
The scene is set in the open countryside, against the backdrop of the Gulf of Naples, at dawn on a promising sunny day; in the clear air, from left to right, we can distinguish Vesuvius, the profile of the island of Capri, the white agglomeration of a shining coastal city, a small temple preceded by a staircase and hosting a female statue surrounded by typical Mediterranean vegetation. In the center of the painting, among the ruins of a classical building, an Ionic-Corinthian capital thrown to the ground and the fragment of the frame of a pediment, we observe two figures, one elderly and the other very young. The elderly man, seated, his gaze turned downwards, points to a fox and a snake wrapped around it, both lifeless and lying on the ground; it is Pliny the Elder — Gaius Plinius Secundus —, the broad forehead, the almost hairless nape of the neck, the marked facial features, the thoughtful air of the sage, who explains to the adolescent, his nephew (and adopted son), Pliny the Younger — Gaius Cecilius Secundus —, what happened in front of them. The episode can be dated to 77-79 AD, the Elder is therefore around fifty-five years old, the Younger is instead between sixteen and seventeen. Pliny the Younger is standing, but in a comfortable position, his legs crossed, reclining on a corner of the ruined building, his intelligent and attentive gaze turned devoutly towards his uncle, ready to transcribe every teaching on a scroll. The helmet and the dagger placed on the ground, inserted low between the two figures, allude to the military role of Pliny the Elder, as prefect of the imperial fleet stationed in Campania. As far as is mentioned in the bibliography, the painting had long been lost.
Cain (1842)
Giovanni Dupré (1817-1882)terracotta, h. 55 cm.
The terracotta is a preparatory sketch for the famous statue of Cain by Giovanni Duprè, which was, together with the companion statue of the Dying Abel, a truly decisive work for romantic naturalism and the overcoming of the conventions of the classicist ideal in sculpture. Both statues were commissioned in marble in 1842 by the Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, daughter of Tsar Nicholas (St. Petersburg, Hermitage) and were later translated into bronze casting for the Grand Duke of Tuscany Leopold II (Florence, Galleria d'arte moderna di Palazzo Pitti). The prestige of the commissions and the locations would have established the fame of two of the most famous statues of our nineteenth century. If the figure of Abel had been represented with limbs in abandon, underlined by the harmonious and sinuous lines, the subsequent statue, Cain after the crime, was conceived as a contrasting pendant, in dramatic scenic dialogue with the first. The success of Cain was less sensational than that of Abele but critics judged it to be a superior work. The terracotta sketch of Cain is placed in the initial phase of the creative process, constituting a first idea. The action differs from that represented in the definitive large model. The pose is also different. In this heroic academy the figure is partly lying on the rock, engaged in an expressive torsion of the body that favors the three-dimensional plastic development against the election of a privileged point of view. It was purchased in 2004 on the antiques market.
Interior of the Siena Cathedral, The Pulpit by Nicola Pisano
Alessandro Maffei (1811-1859)Interior of the Siena Cathedral. The Piccolomini Library.
Watercolor on paper, cm. 98×65
The watercolor, signed by Maffei and dated 1844, is an important document of the state of the Siena Cathedral in the period in question. Next to Pisano's pulpit, in fact, leaning against the marble columns are still present the statues of Giuseppe Mazzuoli, now in London in the Brompton Oratory, which were sold at the end of the nineteenth century. Maffei held the chair of Ornamentation at the Institute of Fine Arts in Siena for about a decade, from 1838 to 1848, when he was called to the same post at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. He practiced among other things in watercolor painting, producing a series of views of Siena and its most illustrious monuments, requested by foreigners, mostly Anglo-Saxon aristocrats, passing through the city. He also produced various lithographs, such as the one evidently taken from the Interior of the Cathedral of Siena, dated 1844. It is not known whether Maffei used an optical camera for his views. Certainly his images seem to compete with the nascent art of photography in those years, and will be taken as a model, sometimes almost plagiarized, in the years to come by foreign engravers. A watercolour obtained from a similar point of view, preparatory for an engraving perhaps never made, is preserved in the Uffizi. The work was purchased in 2005.
Interior of the Siena Cathedral. The Piccolomini Library (1847)
Alessandro Maffei (1811-1859)Interior of the Siena Cathedral. The Piccolomini Library.
Watercolor on paper, cm. 98×65.
The work is signed and dated 1847 and comes together with The Facade of the Cathedral of Siena, by the same author, from an English auction where they were purchased around 1980 by a private collector who sold it in 2005 to the MPS Foundation. This provenance seems to confirm what we learn from a book of drawings that belonged to the well-known engraver Pietro Giusti, preserved at the Biblioteca Comunale of Siena where there is mention of a commission for some frames with watercolours by Maffei to be executed for George Wren. The watercolour reveals Maffei's great ability to portray minutely from life. The bookcase appears to be represented in the smallest details and is a precious testimony to the almost perfect state of conservation of the floor and frescoes; in the centre of the library you can admire the marble group of the Three Graces (a Roman copy of a Hellenistic original), which Francesco Tedeschini acquired in Rome from Cardinal Prospero Colonna. The nineteenth-century floor is made up of rhomboidal ambrogette tiles made by the Ginori factory, which replace the original ones of triangular shape and smaller dimensions, partly preserved in the Deposits of the Museo dell'Opera, partly dispersed in various museums.
The facade of the Siena Cathedral (1851)
Alessandro Maffei (1811-1859)Watercolor on paper, 32×26 cm
The watercolour comes from an English auction, where it was purchased around 1980 by a private collector who sold it in 2005 to the Mps Foundation. This provenance seems to confirm what we learn from a book of drawings that belonged to the famous engraver Pietro Giusti, preserved at the Biblioteca Comunale of Siena where there is mention of a commission for some frames with watercolours by Maffei to be executed for George Wren. The work, dated 1851, is a precious testimony to the state of the facade of the Siena cathedral which here still features the mosaics by Tommaso Redi which were replaced in 1878 with the still current ones executed by Alessandro Franchi and Luigi Mussini.
Pia dé Tolomei (1891-92)
Arturo Viligiardi (1869-1936)oil on canvas, cm 90×181
The interest in architecture, the study of ancient civil and religious buildings of the Middle Ages, finds in these years a valid testing ground in the paintings and in the many drawings in which Viligiardi dedicates himself, as in the case of Pia, to a careful reconstruction down to the smallest details, almost as if through the painted architecture he was trying to identify the basic rules of the art of building.
Viligiardi's will to compose, to build space, is clearly evident in this work, where each element appears to be arranged in a carefully studied way. It is no coincidence that the lunette has a symmetrical axis that coincides with the high circular tower and the balustrade on which the figure of the protagonist is reclining, with precise symbolic values that we will return to later.
Even the use of the lunette inscribed in a rectangle shows particular attention to form and the desire to create, more than a painting, a real object, in which everything, even the metal frame, finely decorated with rosettes and perforated with trilobate motifs, contributes to the staging of a medieval legend, with a Gothic flavour.
The painting is thus placed as a watershed between the academic-youthful phase, which does not go beyond 1894, and the impetuous and symbolist phase that ends before the new century. In fact, the elements of a slow but unstoppable evolution appear evident: on the one hand, the setting, its faithful and perspectively successful rendering of the architecture is the same as that found in the previous paintings, on the other we can note that the reduction in the number of characters and the desire to concentrate all the attention on the figure of the protagonist and on her state of mind are completely new aspects.
In Pia the artist tries to investigate the relationship between the world of sin and that of conversion. For this reason he tries to represent the young woman in meditation, immersed in her pain and intent on atoning for her sins in a Christian way to obtain, like those who “the light of heaven made aware”, divine forgiveness. Moreover, the fact that it is the religious aspect that Viligiardi is interested in in this representation, and not the diatribe that for centuries has tried to identify and reconstruct the true story of the noble Sienese woman is demonstrated by the writing on the frame of the painting «Ricordati di me che, son la Pia / Siena mi fé, disfecemi Maremma», which reports only the first of Dante's verses and not also the two following ones, that is, the most enigmatic ones.
The painter does not seek to enhance the romantic myth of a Pious innocent victim, on the contrary he seems to be disinterested in the various stories narrated by the first Dante commentators, to reflect on those few certainties that come directly from Dante. And, like the great poet, he places the young woman back in the right context of "sinners until the last hour". He depicts her intent on atoning for her sins and captures her in the moment in which she opens up to Grace "arresting every memory of the past at the moment in which spiritual life flows back into her, with the flow of new feelings, in which she begins the rediscovery of herself above all hatred".
The "Ricordati" transcribed by the painter seems to refer to the warning that Pia, through Dante, makes to readers of all times not to forget her example of atonement.
The work was purchased in 2005.
Maremma Landscape (1929)
Memo Vagaggini (1892-1955)cm 31,2×40,8
Signed and dated lower right «Vagaggini 1929 the painting belonged to Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli who gave it to his daughter Marta Bianchi Bandinelli Steg. The Mps Foundation purchased it in 2007.
Born in Santa Fiora, on Mount Amiata, he owes his artistic conversion to the Piedmontese painter Gina Dumonal, his future wife. Self-taught, he moved to Turin between 1919 and 1924 where he participated in the exhibitions of the Società Promotrice. His painting was directed towards the circles of Magic Realism and New Objectivity, with attention to Felice Casorati. Frequent stays in Tuscany during this period, in 1921 he set up his first solo exhibition in Siena at the Circolo Artistico. From 1924 he established his home in Florence, at Villa Romana on the Via Senese, where he would reside until his death in 1955. An illustrator of books, amateur photographer, figure painter, it is in landscape painting and in the depiction of his native places and of the lower Maremma that Vagaggini achieved extraordinary results in the rendering of rarefied atmosphere and clear light: "his painting is as simple as his soul, I would almost say smooth, clean, clear, cheerful, full of air and sun, sometimes sad, infused with a pure nostalgic feeling for his native places, carefully observed in the depths of their soul", wrote Oliviero Della Torre in 19241. Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli must have greatly appreciated Vagaggini's painting, if in 1928 he had already purchased another evocative painting, Fonte di Gemillian-Cogne2, made by the artist during the summer, at the Saletta Gonnelli in Florence.
Nativity Scene (1938)
Vico Consorti (1902-1979)Bronze
The work is composed of three groups (Holy Family with the ox and the donkey, Adoration of the shepherds, Adoration of the Magi) and two isolated figures (Kneeling angel and Standing angel).
With this composition the sculptor participated in the 1934 competition on Nativity scenes announced by ENAPI (National Agency for Crafts and Small Industries) on the occasion of the II Exhibition of the Tuscan Artists' Union together with other works that exalted the fluid and monumental style of Consorti. The artist, who was a student of Fulvio Corsini, in this period totally distanced himself from the Liberty and symbolist style embraced by the Master and expressed himself through figures with slender and elegant proportions with soft profiles and large shiny surfaces. Consorti fully entered into the debate that arose in Siena, around the 1920s, about the need to promote, qualify and update local craftsmanship. The cultural renewal in progress was then aimed at educating citizens about their history and their potential, raising their sensitivity and therefore improving their economic resources. The working of bronze was fully part of the artisan production of ancient tradition. The three bronze groups stand out as works permeated by a classical and balanced, elegant and sober tone.
The work was purchased by the lawyer Alessandro Raselli (professor of Procedural Law from 1927, then Dean and Rector of the University of Siena from 1935 to 1939 as well as Governor of the Nobile Contrada dell'Oca from 1939 to 1964), with whom the artist had a privileged relationship characterised by shared interests in music and art and his friendship with Count Guido Chigi Saracini, of whom he was a friend and advisor.
The work was purchased by the Monte dei Paschi Foundation in 2007.
Resurrection of Christ (1890)
Cesare Maccari (1840-1919)Charcoal on paper, 78×66 cm
The Mps Foundation purchased these two works in 2004 on the antiques market.
These are the preparatory studies for the fresco in the Clementini Piccolomini chapel in the Misericordia cemetery in Siena, where the artist had already painted, in 1887, an Allegory of Faith, a Madonna and Child, and the Portrait of the Franci couple in the chapel of the family of the same name.
Born in Siena, Cesare Maccari initially trained as a sculptor in the studio of Tito Sarrocchi, which he entered in 1856. Introduced to painting by Luigi Mussini, he approached fresco painting in 1862 with the decoration of the vault of the chapel of the Villa Pieri Nerli di Quinciano (Four Evangelists), an important neo-Gothic building site where various artists from the Royal Senese Institute of Fine Arts worked. The vigorous plasticism demonstrated by Maccari in that pictorial undertaking is still evident, almost three decades later, in the Resurrection of Christ, and appears more evident in the preparatory study, when compared with the final fresco realization. Although the structure of the composition remains unchanged – where the four figures of soldiers and the landscape elements are arranged along an ellipse with the Redeemer at the center – the introduction of the chromatic aspect has reduced the volumetric effect, especially in the draperies of the centurions in the foreground. The background, here slightly shaded in the use of charcoal, takes on greater prominence in the fresco, enlivened by the two balanced spots of blue: in the tomb on the right, and in the distance, behind the tree, on the left.
Resurrection of Christ (1890)
Cesare Maccari (1840-1919)Oil on canvas, cm 39×33
The Mps Foundation purchased these two works in 2004 on the antiques market.
These are the preparatory studies for the fresco in the Clementini Piccolomini chapel in the Misericordia cemetery in Siena, where the artist had already painted, in 1887, an Allegory of Faith, a Madonna and Child, and the Portrait of the Franci couple in the chapel of the family of the same name.
Born in Siena, Cesare Maccari initially trained as a sculptor in the studio of Tito Sarrocchi, which he entered in 1856. Introduced to painting by Luigi Mussini, he approached fresco painting in 1862 with the decoration of the vault of the chapel of the Villa Pieri Nerli di Quinciano (Four Evangelists), an important neo-Gothic building site where various artists from the Royal Senese Institute of Fine Arts worked. The vigorous plasticism demonstrated by Maccari in that pictorial undertaking is still evident, almost three decades later, in the Resurrection of Christ, and appears more evident in the preparatory study, when compared with the final fresco realization. Although the structure of the composition remains unchanged – where the four figures of soldiers and the landscape elements are arranged along an ellipse with the Redeemer at the center – the introduction of the chromatic aspect has reduced the volumetric effect, especially in the draperies of the centurions in the foreground. The background, here slightly shaded in the use of charcoal, takes on greater prominence in the fresco, enlivened by the two balanced spots of blue: in the tomb on the right, and in the distance, behind the tree, on the left.
Frescoed ceiling
In the antechapel, the Melani brothers succeeded in illusionistically modifying the 'Gothic' structure of the room, transforming it into a splendid colonnaded atrium. The painted architectures of Francesco surround the figures of Giuseppe Melani, who paints the Meditation seated on a cloud, which leads a soul to Paradise. Next to it, Faith is flanked by three little angels holding the tablets of the law, Innocence by a lamb, Hope dressed in green. The walls are decorated with motifs from the Old Testament.The "porcelain room"
The so-called Porcelain Room was frescoed in 1727. At the top, Jupiter is depicted seated on clouds with the eagle and Eternity, intent on crowning Virtue. Next to him, Mercury and Doctrine. Towards the façade, Virtue (crowned with laurel, with helmet and spear) is together with Cupid who, armed with arrows, chases away Vengeance (cloaked in red) and Lust.Frescoed ceiling
In the gallery, Ferretti creates the Glory of Hercules after his labors. The Demigod (the putto holding the lion's skin) is carried to heaven by Eternity and Minerva; next to him is portrayed Ganymede with the cup and Mercury. Pan and his assistants witness the scene, while the genies of Music play. Juno, opposed to the Demigod, flees. Antaeus and the Centaur are portrayed dying.Frescoed ceiling
The ceiling of the main floor depicts The Birth of Jupiter, from whose head, struck with the axe by Vulcan, we see an armed Minerva. Next to it, Juno, the winged genius and below the three graces. Love, Psyche – with butterfly wings – together with a peacock and a divinity, perhaps Juno. Eros and two putti holding his attributes: the bow and the flame of passion. The hall was inaugurated on 6 February 1746 for the wedding of Giovanni with Porzia Gori Pannilini. In their honour there were three days of celebration in the Campo, culminating with a Pallonata organised by the Congrega dé Rozzi and a Carnival party in the hall of the Palace.The Roccabruna Room
On the ceiling of the Roccabruna room is depicted the Allegory of the Night: Night in the moonlight above the chariot, accompanied by Aeolus and the winds. In front, Sleep as a young man who rests and in the background the Rape of Proserpina, to symbolize what can happen in the night hours when vigilance is low. Sleep sleeps under the torch of the moonlight.
