Some Early Drawings by Mauro Gandolfi

Some Early Drawings by Mauro GandolfiAuthor(s): Mimi CazortSource: Master Drawings, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Summer, 1995), pp. 144-151Published by: Master Drawings AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554206 .

Accessed: 07/12/2014 11:58

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Master Drawings Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to MasterDrawings.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 128.235.251.160 on Sun, 7 Dec 2014 11:58:11 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=mda

http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554206?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


Some Early Drawings by Mauro Gandolfi

Mimi Cazort

In Memory ofJacob Bean

Considerable progress has been made over the past quarter century in distinguishing the drawings of Ubaldo and Gaetano Gandolfi in both the chalk and the

pen-and-wash media, but Mauro (Bologna 1764-I834), Gaetano's son, has remained elusive as a draftsman. One reason for this is undoubtedly that Mauro's painting ca- reer was so brief and his completed works so scarce that it is difficult to find anything to link preparatory draw-

ings to. He maintained, in his manuscript autobiogra- phy, that he perfected his skills as a draftsman while still a child by copying his father's drawings, noting with satisfaction that Gaetano himself was often fooled by the

copies.' I will show here that Mauro also copied draw-

ings by his uncle Ubaldo. Moreover, these copies pro- vide clues as to the origins of Mauro's pen-and-wash style.

Two drawings in pen and wash by Ubaldo show variant compositions for The Scourging of Christ: one in a private collection in Paris (Fig. I),2 the other in the Biblioteca Reale, Turin (Fig. 2).3 The drawings are

homogenous in style, close in size, and share certain architectural and figural details. The oafish soldier

slouching at the right in the Paris drawing has been shifted to the left in the Turin sheet. Ubaldo's vigorous and varied pen line links the compositional elements and also clarifies the three-dimensionality of the figures and the space in which they act. The wash models the

figures and creates cast shadows that help define the ar- chitecture. Areas of white paper represent reflected

light; edges where light meets shadow are crisp. Ubaldo's signature conventions for anatomical details such as muscles, feet, and facial features are conspicu- ous. The two sheets may be studies for a Passion series, which was either not executed or has not yet come to

light; both are consistent with Ubaldo's style of the

early 1770s.4 Another drawing is identical in composition to the

one in Turin (present whereabouts unknown; Fig. 3).5 However, the difference in the way that the hands are

depicted is immediately apparent, and I suggest that this sheet is a copy by Mauro after his uncle's original. Mauro's drawing reflects a very different set of artistic concerns in which decorative surface takes precedence over spatial definition, and grace supplants the dynamic clarity of the original. The line has a cursive quality, the

pen clinging to the paper as if following calligraphic dictates of its own. In contrast to Ubaldo's muscular efforts to carve out, with his drawing tools, the delin- eation of male figures in violent action, Mauro rele-

gated anatomical exactitude (which he had studied and knew well) to second place, carelessly confounding the boundaries of flesh and drapery.

Ubaldo typically alternated wash and line in devel-

oping his compositions, applying the wash in contra-

[ 144 ]



Figure 1 UBALDO GANDOLFI. Soldiers Scourging the Fallen Christ.

Paris, Private Collection.

puntal harmony with the black chalk underdrawing and the pen line, always in conformity with the exigencies of structural definition. In Mauro's version, the wash is

applied on top of the still wet pen lines, producing a blurred effect. The technique of applying wash over wet ink had its antecedent in Guercino's drawings, but has no corollary in the work of either Gaetano or Ubaldo. The effect, in Mauro's case, is to translate the rigorous formal definition of Ubaldo's original into a pleasant play of light and shadow: calligraphy and surface are primary.

The verso of the sheet provides additional insights into its authorship (Fig. 4). We see two delicate sketches of teste di carattere, with their blank eyes and the precisely controlled pen hatching, characteristic of those female

fantasy heads that can be attributed to Mauro and sug- gestive of his work as a reproductive engraver.6 Also on the verso are nine lines of script, attributable to Mauro on the basis of his many extant letters.7 The script is

only partly decipherable, not because it is illegible, but because its cryptic message seems to address some private concern, and thus defies interpretation.8

The same oafish soldier of the recto appears isolated on the verso, a simple line tracing from the front of the sheet. This figure, who seems to have caught Mauro's

imagination, leads us to a drawing in the Uffizi, here also attributed to Mauro (Fig. 5).9 In the top right quad- rant of this sheet he copies the three primary protago- nists of the Paris drawing by Ubaldo (Fig. 2): the fallen

[ 145 ]



Figure 2 UBALDO GANDOLFI. The Scourging of Christ.

Turin, Biblioteca Reale.

Christ, the surly soldier on the right, and Christ's tor- mentor on the left.'0

A close comparison between the two drawings shows that Mauro copied the main contour lines of Ubaldo's

figures closely, but allowed his delight in pure calligraphy to take over when dealing with the more exigent areas of drapery and muscle definition. The reliance on contour to reproduce a figure helps explain the super- ficial and decorative appearance of Mauro's drawn

copies. In the Uffizi drawing he has not blurred the line with wash, but has applied the wash in cursory fashion, especially in the figures' limbs, thus compromising the subtle modeling of the original. The use of wash to iso- late the figures from their ambience also contributes to the curious flatness of the group.

Turning the drawing vertically, we see that Mauro has also copied a fragment from Ubaldo's preparatory drawing for The Finding of the True Cross, executed in

1775 for the cathedral of S. Eusebio in Vercelli." Mauro's cursive line belies any formal function, be-

coming primarily decorative, and he included a touch of his signature "engraver's hatching," an idiosyncracy never seen in Ubaldo's drawings. He has, in his fanciful

way, expanded the group of cross and ladder bearers and,

surprisingly, added a rose in flower. The sheet, in its to-

tality, makes no sense as a preparatory study, but stands as a graceful and composite copy after two originals.

One final drawing by Mauro, the Assumption of the

Virgin in the Art Institute of Chicago (Fig. 6),12 resem- bles the Soldiers Scourging the Fallen Christ (Fig. 3) in its

[ 146]



21'I

/

^ !j u .

7B ̂ k..,

j

Figure 3 MAURO GANDOLFI. The Scourging of Christ.

Present whereabouts unknown.

[ 147 ]

T j

1 1

bis

1.

1i

I

_- , ^.

. 'l:*"



: . I P. A ,.

)l 11- .-- , . -'- I .., ri'? ? . . .11 , . .

? i.- ?,

.11 -N lll

. i .-/ - 'A

-"Oo. c

0 ll ---Ik

rar ..n

i jr _ir

I? )?? * It G ?''*

,'. ?..,

'?B ' i9 rij; u? J r

; "j:, 'L,i

R? t-1?

"'

S.Jr, ??.?.???.

.r

Figure 4 MAURO GANDOLFI.

Study for Standing Soldier; Two Female Heads; Various

Inscriptions. Verso of Figure 3.

style, mannerisms, and technical handling. Mauro's

drawing is copied after Ubaldo's study (Fig. 7)13 for a

painting in Imola dated I77.144

This group of drawings suggests that Mauro, espe-

cially during his formative years, copied from his uncle

as well as from his father. Of the original sheets by Ubaldo cited here that Mauro used as models, one can

be firmly dated to 1771 and the other two are tenta-

tively assigned on stylistic grounds to this period as well.

Thus, all three would have been in Ubaldo's studio for

the young artist to copy before his departure for France

in 1780 at the age of sixteen for his Wandejahre, from

which he returned in 1786. The small group here as-

signed to Mauro, together with the three pen-and- wash sheets already published in the recent exhibition

catalogue and that can be tentatively dated to the I790S,

provides guidelines for disentangling Mauro's identity as a draftsman from that of his father and his uncle.l5

1. "Brevi cenni della vita di Mauro Gandolfi bolognese, Pit-

tore, disegnatore ed incisore a taglio reale: Prefazione, note e vignette di Augusto Zanotti," n Comune di Bologna, 1925,

II, no. 2, pp. 73-8I, 145-53; no. 6, pp. 388-93.

2. Pen and dark brown ink, gray-brown wash; 246 x 202 mm. A compositional variant of the Paris drawing by Ubaldo is the Soldiers Scourging the Fallen Christ (pen and brown ink, brown wash, over traces of black chalk: 283 x 216 mm.), formerly Lester Avnet collection (New York, Christie's, 15

January 1992, lot no. 54, repr.). Two copies of lesser quality have come through Christie's, London: one in red chalk,

pen, brown ink, and wash; 222 x 182 mm. (I December

I970, lot no. I74, repr.); and another in pen and brown

ink, brown wash; 285 x 202 mm. (I July 1986, lot no. 92,

repr.).

3. Inv. no. I6I43. Pen and brown ink, brown wash; 221 x 190 mm. A. Bertini, I disegni italiani della Biblioteca Reale di Torino, Rome, 1958, no. 642.

4. No Passion series is mentioned in the early sources and it is

unlikely that such a commission would have escaped the no- tice of Marcello Oretti, whose listing of Ubaldo's oeuvre is re-

markably complete (MS B 134, Biblioteca Comunale,

Bologna).

5. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over traces of black chalk; 238 x I98 mm. Formerly in a private collection, Berkshire,

England (London, Christie's, I9 April 1988, lot no. 58, repr.). The late Hugh Macandrew kindly called my attention to this drawing some years ago when it was temporarily on

deposit at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.

6. Donatella Biagi Maino has recently presented a cogent case for returning to Gaetano those pen teste relating to Luigi Ta- dolini's set of reproductive etchings, noting that Gaetano's name is inscribed in the plates as inventor (see her article, "Gaetano Gandolfi's 'capricci' of Heads: Drawings and En-

gravings," Burlington Magazine, CXXXVI, 1994, pp. 376-79). The attributional problem of the innumerable teste is complicated by the fact that some of the sheets bear old and sometimes autograph inscriptions with the name of

Mauro, or of Gaetano. Moreover, Mauro stated in his auto-

graph listing of his oeuvre that he had made "40 cappricci dis-

egnati all'inchiostro," which likely refers to at least some of the capricci of heads (see his "Testamento, I5 Luglio 1831," in MS Raccolta Palotti, Autog. Pall. XIV839, coll. Autog. XXXI, Biblioteca Comunale, Bologna). The stylization of the components in the capricci complex renders them suscep- tible to endless variations and copies. For a discussion of this "problema di non facile soluzione," and a review of the lit-

[ 148 ]



I : '

1S

~0C)&J?~3)T >2

?LN4 .- v

'<* @^

*<_Y dl

AN


Soldiers Scourging the Fallen Christ; The Elevation of the Cross.

Florence, Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe.

[ 149 1

i

S

4. .~t~ * A

f

A p

It,

I

1

1: : 1

* ' i' of ;s t.i~

nmv



t.

(

i K

r

)

6 . , ? ...

^':T .

'

. . .

^ t4 gw .-


Assumption of the Virgin with the Apostles. Art Institute of Chicago, Leonora Hall Gurley Collection.

[ 150 ]

X1

i.:

* ? :?

..

li:? -? ; ' if *

Ir_'*; ;?" i * : i .- u: T.

.I xrl,

! lt



erature to that point, see Cazort in I Gandolfi, exh. cat., Fon- dazione Cini, Venice, 1987, pp. 49-51, nos. 39-43.

7. MS Raccolta Pallotti, nos. 1-49.

8. The text seems to be the draft of a letter addressed to Domenico Antonini, a late eighteenth-century painter and decorator who worked in Piacenza. Mauro speaks of a "desiderio di morire" and "E delle Volte non bisogna gratare tanto la panzia alla cignella perche gridera ma non trovo ri- poso ... mi farete divenire un profetta diacono di Sanbuco nella Via dell Cazzo ... Imprimatura Agripina e suoi genz- ium." Mauro's letters bristle with complaints and paranoia.

9. Inv. no. 4447S. Pen and dark brown ink, gray-brown wash, on tan paper; 317 x 225 mm. Watermark: "C" in two con- centric circles.

10. The total measurements of the Uffizi sheet are larger by some IO centimeters than the ones previously discussed, but the group of three figures is approximately the same size as that in the Paris drawing.

11. Ubaldo's drawing is now in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow (inv. no. I3383). See M. Maiskaya, Igrandi disegni italiani del Museo Pushkin, Milan, 1986, no. 50; D. Benati, Disegni emil- iani del Sei-Settecento . . ., Milan, 1991, no. 82.4; P. Bagni, I Gandolfi, Bologna, 1992, no. 157, repr.

12. Inv. no. 22.588. Pen and brown ink, brown wash; 295 x 208 mm.

13. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over traces of black chalk; 301 x 212 mm. Inscribed on recto, Gandolfi. Watermark: an- chor in circle below star. London, Christie's, I July 1986, lot no. 94, repr.

14. For the painting, see Bagni, 1992, no. 126. Only the central

group of the Assumption with Angels was finally executed, in an oval format.

15. M. Cazort and G. Perini, Bella Pittura. The Art of the Gandolfi, exh. cat., National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 1993, nos. I08-IIo.

,. I ~~~~~~~~~~~t~~~~ci?._~~~~~~~~- .

.,,

I ;t 3, ',?i~~~~~~~~~~~f-

i?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .,.I ~: ~." '

ii~~~~~~~~~ C .'~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ,? ,_ ' "'":~.... .._..,.~ f'~ ,'a'~.~.. ; f' .

i~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~i--

Figure 7 UBALDO GANDOLFI.

Assumption of the Virgin with the Apostles. Present whereabouts unknown.

[ 151]



Documents

Some Early Drawings by Mauro Gandolfi