After the success achieved with the contemporary art section at the auction held on 20th and 21st May 2009, Sotheby’s Milan is about to present a selection of 199 lots, to be auctioned on 9th and 10th June, respectively at 6 pm and 7 pm at Palazzo Broggi. The first session on 9th June will be dedicated to Important Ancient Paintings of the Contini Bonacossi Collection, 19th century Paintings, with a Gerolamo Induno dedicated to the Unification of Italy, while the next day will be dedicated to furniture, ceramics, art objects and antique books. Undisputed star of the 19th century paintings is the canvas by Gerolamo Induno: Donne romane, scena contemporanea (Roman women, contemporary scene), also known with the name Ascoltando la notizia del giorno (Listening to the day’s news), on the market for an estimate between 350,000 and 450,000 Euros. The painting realised in 1864 was presented in the same year by the painter at the Exhibition of Fine Arts of Brera and belongs to a genre of works dear to Induno since the late 1840s, and fully developed in the early 1860s. That was the period when the Lombard painter narrated historical episodes, combining the patriotic subject with the expressive writing characteristic of genre painting and lowering the historical theme into the dimension of everyday life. Donne Romane deals with one of the episodes which was determining for the national Unification – the annexation of Rome to the Reign of Italy – represented by a group of women reading out loud a paper in a domestic environment, where the pacific family atmosphere matches the perception of confiding hope in the gestures of the female group.
Very prestigious, and also belonging to the Contini Bonacossi collection – from which many masterpieces now exposed at the Galleria degli Uffizi come from – is also Ritratto di donna col liuto (Portrait of woman with lute) by Francesco Ubertini called Bachiacca (estimate 250,000-350,000€). The painting, which is a marvellous example of Renaissance portraiture, has been round the world through important collections: Samderson Collection in Edimburgh, Fischer Collection in Nnew York, 1911, Trotti Collection in Paris and then Contini Bonacossi Collection.
The same estimate (250,000-350,000 Euros) also for La chiamata di Sant’Andrea (Saint Andrew’s call) by Federico Barocci. This oil on canvas (80.5 x 60.5 cm), characterised by a rarefied atmosphere and a hinted mannerism, is actually a sketch, a study for the realisation of a larger altarpiece for Saint Andrew’s oratory in Pesaro – on request of the duchess of Urbino Lucrezia d’Este – and is now kept at the Musées Royaux in Brussels. The composition, inspired to the model of Raffaello’s tapestries in the Vatican, gives prominence to the figure of Andrew, who is the first to respond to Christ’s call, while his brother Peter in the background is still clumsily trying to get off the boat.
A nice example of Annibale Carracci’s early painting is Maddalena in preghiera (Praying Magdalene), proposed with an estimate between 120,000 and 160,000 euros. The subject is soft and endearing, also thanks to an attempt of intonation in Tiziano style and of neo-Venetian derivation. The lightness of the draping and the hair, like the delicacy of the Magdalene’s profile, make it a work of immediate emotional participation.
More distinct and mock-classical is Saint Cecilia by Giovan Battista Salvi (estimate 70,000-100,000 Euros), called Sassoferrato, which is a piece of rare definition in its artistic production. The mysticism and spirituality of his Madonnas are absent in this solid portrait, in which the Saint is elegantly depicted in all her emotional appearance and with an unusual, though discrete, sensuality.
Interesting also a small oil on plywood signed Giovanni Boldini, with an estimate of 65,000-85,000 Euros.
Leaving the paintings section, we find precious objects of rare beauty even in the interior design section, the majolicas and the antique books of the collection. A rare enamelled and embossed bowl, realised in a Venice workshop in the 16th century, is at auction with an estimate ranging between 100,000 and 150,000 Euros. Another Venetian production is the exceptional cabinet with applications of rare marble and hard stones, in lacquered and gold painted wood (estimate 70,000-100,000 Euros). The piece of furniture, considering its excellent state of preservation, its size and the elegance of its ornamental motifs, can be considered one of the most important Venetian cabinets realised in the late 16th century.
Among the books Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy (estimate 15,000-20,000 Euros) [with comments by Cristoforo Landino], published in Venice in 1941, is in excellent conditions, like De Claris Mulieribus by Jacobus Philippus Bergomensis (Ferrara: Lorenzo De Rubeis, 29th April 1497), proposed with an estimate of 25,000-35,000 Euros.
To see the complete auction click here:
http://www.arcadja.com/auctions/en/private/sothebys/2009/6/9/1450527854/
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