Lot 3001* - A210 Old Master Paintings - Friday, 20. September 2024, 02.00 PM
TOMMASO DEL MAZZA
(active in Florence, Pisa and Prato 1377–1392
Madonna and Child with the Archangel Michael. Circa 1375.
Tempera and gold ground on canvas on panel.
117 × 46.2 cm.
Provenance:
- Private collection of Admiral Saint-Bon, Paris, 1903.
- Private collection of Michele Lazzaroni, Paris.
- European private collection.
- Sale Lempertz, Cologne, 18.11.2017, lot 2002.
- European private collection.
Literature:
- Samuel J. Wagstaff: An Exhibition of Italian Panels and Manuscripts from the 13th and 14th centuries in Honor of Richard Offner, Wadsworth Atheneum Hartford (CT) 1965, p. 14. no. 6.
- Beneth A. Jones: The Bob Jones University Collection of Religious Paintings. Supplement to the Catalogue of the Art Collection. Paintings Acquired 1963–1968, Greenville (SC) 1968, p. 9.
- Burton B. Fredericksen and Federico Zeri: Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections, Cambridge (Mass.) 1972, p. 136.
- Miklos Boskovits: La pittura Fiorentina alla viglia del Rinascimento, Florence 1975, pp. 106 and 230, note 99, p. 384.
- Simona Pasquinucci and Barbara Deimling: Tradition and Innovation in Florentine Trecento Painting: Giovanni Bonsi-Tommaso del Mazza, in: Miklos Boskovits (ed.): Corpus of Florentine Painting IV/VIII, Florence 2000, pp. 201–202.
- Barbara Deimling / John M. Nolan / Carl Brandon Strehlke / Yvonne Szafran: Discovering a Pre-Renaissance Master. Tommaso del Mazza, Greenville 2008, p. 72.
This exceptionally fine and well-preserved painting of the Madonna is a typical early work by the artist Tommaso del Mazza, who was formerly known as Maestro di Santa Verdiana, after his ‘Heavenly Madonna dell’ Umiltà with Saint Verdiana’ in the High Museum of Art in Atlanta (for the identification of the artist, see Barbara Deimling: Il Maestro di Santa Verdiana. Un polittico disperso e il problema dell'identificazione, in: Arte Cristiana, LXXIX, 1991, pp. 401–411).
The goldfinch, which the Christ Child holds in his hand, is of particular iconographic significance, with the red mark on its head symbolising the suffering of Jesus during the Passion. The impending sacrifice of Christ is alluded to by the innocent fragility of the goldfinch. In 14th-century Italy, often beset by the plague, goldfinches were also regarded as bringers of health and thus as a symbol of healing and redemption. This motif was later taken up in Renaissance painting, including by Raphael in his ‘Madonna del Cardellino’ (Uffizi, Florence, inv. no. 1890 n. 1447).
The panel offered here was once part of a larger altarpiece: the lateral panel with the Baptist is probably in a private collection in London, while the panel with St Peter is possibly the one in the collection of the Bob Jones University Gallery (inv. no. 63.331.29; see Pasquinucci and Deimling 2000, pp. 199–207).
A panel in a Tuscan private collection with a depiction of the ‘Mystic Marriage of St Catherine of Alexandria’, which can also be attributed to Tommaso del Mazza's early work, shows strong stylistic parallels (see Pasquinucci and Deimling 2000, pp. 194–196). The artist's early period still bore the influence of the art of the Florentine Orcagna brothers (Andrea di Cione di Arcangelo (c. 1308–1368) and his brothers Nardo and Jacopo), under whom Tommaso del Mazza had received his training. With its simplified and abstracted forms and statuary, this Madonna shows stylistic references to another ‘Orcagnesco’, Giovanni del Biondo (1356–1399), and places the panel at a time when Tommaso del Mazza (1385–1400) had not yet embraced the artistic preferences of Niccolò di Pietro Gerini (1340–1414) and the late Gothic linear tendencies of Agnolo Gaddi (1350–1396). Prof Gaudenz Freuler therefore considers a date of around 1375 to be probable, a view shared by Barbara Deimling (2000), who suggests a date of around 1375–1380.
The known œuvre of Tommaso del Mazza, which continually developed in elegance and artistic quality, as well as his extensive artistic activity for the Datini family of merchants in Prato, attest to his remarkable artistic status within Florentine painting at the end of the 14th century.
We would like to thank Prof. Dr Gaudenz Freuler for his scholarly contribution to the cataloguing of this painting.
The goldfinch, which the Christ Child holds in his hand, is of particular iconographic significance, with the red mark on its head symbolising the suffering of Jesus during the Passion. The impending sacrifice of Christ is alluded to by the innocent fragility of the goldfinch. In 14th-century Italy, often beset by the plague, goldfinches were also regarded as bringers of health and thus as a symbol of healing and redemption. This motif was later taken up in Renaissance painting, including by Raphael in his ‘Madonna del Cardellino’ (Uffizi, Florence, inv. no. 1890 n. 1447).
The panel offered here was once part of a larger altarpiece: the lateral panel with the Baptist is probably in a private collection in London, while the panel with St Peter is possibly the one in the collection of the Bob Jones University Gallery (inv. no. 63.331.29; see Pasquinucci and Deimling 2000, pp. 199–207).
A panel in a Tuscan private collection with a depiction of the ‘Mystic Marriage of St Catherine of Alexandria’, which can also be attributed to Tommaso del Mazza's early work, shows strong stylistic parallels (see Pasquinucci and Deimling 2000, pp. 194–196). The artist's early period still bore the influence of the art of the Florentine Orcagna brothers (Andrea di Cione di Arcangelo (c. 1308–1368) and his brothers Nardo and Jacopo), under whom Tommaso del Mazza had received his training. With its simplified and abstracted forms and statuary, this Madonna shows stylistic references to another ‘Orcagnesco’, Giovanni del Biondo (1356–1399), and places the panel at a time when Tommaso del Mazza (1385–1400) had not yet embraced the artistic preferences of Niccolò di Pietro Gerini (1340–1414) and the late Gothic linear tendencies of Agnolo Gaddi (1350–1396). Prof Gaudenz Freuler therefore considers a date of around 1375 to be probable, a view shared by Barbara Deimling (2000), who suggests a date of around 1375–1380.
The known œuvre of Tommaso del Mazza, which continually developed in elegance and artistic quality, as well as his extensive artistic activity for the Datini family of merchants in Prato, attest to his remarkable artistic status within Florentine painting at the end of the 14th century.
We would like to thank Prof. Dr Gaudenz Freuler for his scholarly contribution to the cataloguing of this painting.
CHF 150 000 / 250 000 | (€ 154 640 / 257 730)