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Premium GIOVANNI GIROLAMO BONESI (Bologna, 1653 - 1725)
Rebecca at t…
See original version (Italian)
GIOVANNI GIROLAMO BONESI (Bologna, 1653 - 1725)
Rebecca at t…
See original version (Italian)
Lot no. 35
Description
GIOVANNI GIROLAMO BONESI
(Bologna, 1653 - 1725)
Rebecca at the Well
Oil on canvas, 142.4X213.5 cm
The painting under examination was traced back to Girolamo Bonesi's catalogue by Maria Letizia Paoletti, noting the similarities in composition and style with the artist's graphic proofs and the canvas now conserved at the Opera Pia dei Poveri Vergognosi depicting Bathsheba at the Bath (oil on canvas, 175x233 cm). In support of this working hypothesis, the scholar quotes the testimony of Marcello Oretti who, on page 42 of his manuscript cites: '[b] 117/14 La ritrovata [= finding] di Moisè nel Nilo (today in Palazzo Taverna in Montegiordano); altra storia credo di Rebecca, figure [quanto il naturale] ; C. Scarani, ibidem'. Paoletti also notes as evidence in support of the autography various repentances clearly visible with infrared photography and identifiable in the left arm of the boy pointing at Rebecca, on the faces of Rebecca and the young man with stick and barrel. Gerolamo Bonesi's personality is handed down to us by Giampietro Zanotti, who says he was a pupil of Giovanni Maria Viani and later 'fell in love' with Carlo Cignani's manner, going so far as to repudiate his first master, remarking: he did not paint anything that was not esteemed and appreciated by his professors for a certain sufficient beauty and perfection, which he always diligently studied and sought after; and by others for a supreme gaiety and smoothness that most attracted and delighted them' (cf. G. P. Zanotti, Storia dell'Accademia Clementina di Bologna, Bologna 1739, II, p. 247, p. 288).
The work is accompanied by a critical file by Maria Letizia Paoletti.
Reference bibliography:
Gli splendori della Vergogna. La collezione dei dipinti dell'opera Pia dei Poveri Vergognosi, edited by C. Masini, Bologna 1995, p. 128; 232, no. 46
Figure del tempo barocco. Dipinti dell'Opera Pia dei Poveri Vergognosi a Bologna, exhibition catalogue edited by M. Riccomini, Bologna 2016, ad vocem
See original version (Italian)
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