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a painting of a woman holding a child in her lapa painting of a woman holding a baby in her lapan old wooden frame with a burlock paper backing
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41 - JACOPO ROBUSTI, known as IL TINTORETTO
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Estimate €50,000 - €80,000
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Description
JACOPO ROBUSTI, known as IL TINTORETTO (Venice, 1518/19 – 1594) Madonna and Child (The Curtis Madonna) c. 1538 Oil on canvas, 143 × 110 cm The painting has been declared to be of extraordinary historical and artistic interest and is subject to a notification regime; it may therefore not be exported from Italy. The painting has been declared to be of extraordinary historical and artistic interest and is subject to a notification regime; it may not be exported from Italy. Provenance: Venice, Curtis Collection, Palazzo Barbaro on the Grand Canal (since the late 19th century) Bibliography: R. Pallucchini, *La giovinezza di Tintoretto*, Milan 1950, pp. 77, 154, note 23 Arslan, 1960, p. 33, note 44 R. Pallucchini, *Tintoretto*, Florence 1969, p. 10 The Complete Works of Tintoretto. Introduction by C. Bernari. Critical and philological apparatus by P. De Vecchi, Milan 1970, no. 11, pp. 86–87 Pallucchini, The Early Years of Tintoretto. The Early Years of El Greco. Mimeographed lecture notes, edited by P. Rossi, University of Padua. Institute of Art History, Chair of Modern Art History, 1974–1975, pp. 57–58 R. Pallucchini and P. Rossi, Tintoretto. Sacred and Secular Works, Milan 1982, Vol. I, p. 133, no. 15, illustrated fig. 12 R. Echols, F. Ilchman, ‘Toward a new Tintoretto catalogue’ in Jacopo Tintoretto: Proceedings of the International Congress, Madrid, Museo Nacional del Prado, 26–27 February 2007, p. 121, no. 5 A. Donati, ‘Tintoretto, back to square one. The problem of the catalogue and a hypothetical addition to Giovanni Galizzi’, in *Studi Veneziani*, LXXIII, 2016, pp. 275–276, note 63, fig. 4 Having belonged since the late nineteenth century to the famous collection of the Anglo-American Curtis family at Palazzo Barbaro on the Grand Canal; one of the most sophisticated cultural circles in fin-de-siècle Venice, frequented by Henry James and John Singer Sargent – the painting presented here constitutes an extraordinarily significant piece of evidence for tracing the early career of Jacopo Robusti. The painting makes a strong philological contribution to the debate on the painter’s early years, emerging as a crucial point for understanding his stylistic evolution. Its qualitative and formal significance is precisely reflected in the recent essay by Andrea Donati (see Donati 2016), who describes the painting as ‘of great beauty’, recognising in it ‘all the characteristics of the young Tintoretto, who here takes his first steps with absolute audacity’. In this formative phase, dating from around 1538, the composition masterfully and empirically resolves the early Venetian influences: on the one hand, one can discern echoes of the landscape and the refined perspectival spatiality of Bonifacio Veronese; as duly highlighted in his day by Rodolfo Pallucchini – whilst, on the other, there is already a sense of exuberant monumentality borrowed from the models of Jacopo Sansovino, the architect responsible for spreading the Central Italian ‘maniera’ in Venice. It was precisely this intense dialogue with Tuscan-Roman culture that prompted the fledgling Tintoretto to make a unique technical choice, executed with extreme precision: he prepared the canvas as if it were a panel, applying a ground layer so dense and meticulous that it entirely concealed the fabric’s weave. On this smooth surface, Jacopo defined the forms with a boldness of line and a use of colour that must have seemed disruptive to his contemporaries and, as Donati suggests, such pictorial ‘swagger’ must likely have shaken the rigid canons of the Venetian old guard, provoking the early mistrust and suspicion of Tiziano Vecellio in the face of such an independent and indomitable talent (see Donati 2016). From a strictly material and conservationist perspective, the painted surface is currently covered by an old varnish, the thickness of which dulls its original brilliance, but, as Donati notes, it is clear that the removal of the surface varnish promises to restore the fabrics and flesh tones to their original vibrant liveliness, fully revealing the superb chromatic quality and the effectiveness of the luminous contrasts (see Donati, *Il giovane Tintoretto*, exhibition catalogue edited by R. Battaglia, P. Marini and V. Romani, 2018, no. 29 (cited))
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About the sale FROM THE CURTIS COLLECTIONS AT PALAZZO BARBARO: PAINTINGS, FURNITURE AND WORKS OF ART
Auction location
Auction time 09/29/2026 at 2:45 PM
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