Moses breaks the tables of the law
| Reference: | S44000 |
| Author | Andrea ANDREANI |
| Year: | 1590 ca. |
| Measures: | 1770 x 604 mm |
€12,500.00
| Reference: | S44000 |
| Author | Andrea ANDREANI |
| Year: | 1590 ca. |
| Measures: | 1770 x 604 mm |
€12,500.00
Description
Moses breaks the tables of the law, from a subject by Domenico Beccafumi
Woodcut and wash, on four (of eight) sheets, 1590.
In the work of Andrea Andreani, one of the most productive representatives of late 16th century Italian woodcuts, the tradition of multi-woodcut woodcuts (chiaroscuro) and that of large format woodcuts, the so-called gigantographs, printed on several sheets, converge. The present work is the lower half of the woodcut Moses Breaking the Tables of the Law, made in 1590 after Domenico Beccafumi's inlay of the floor in Siena Cathedral and Francesco Vanni's preparatory drawings.
This woodcut, made by Andrea Andreani, represents the central detail of a larger and more articulated composition that the mannerist painter Domenico Beccafumi designed for the decoration of some panels, placed near the altar, of the floor of Siena Cathedral, defined by Vasari as "the most beautiful, great and magnificent that has ever been made".
The monumental woodcut constitutes a sort of technical 'tour de force'. The various poses and emotions of the countless protagonists, vividly observed, are rendered with great intensity.
In a congenial manner, Andreani has succeeded in translating the complexity of Beccafumi's masterpiece.
The complete depiction in the Hamburger Kunsthalle (Inv.-Nr. 1136), for example, was printed from a black plate and three clay plates in dark grey, light grey and beige on eight sheets. There are also copies of the black line plates with wash, as in the collection of the Rijksprentenkabinett (grey wash, Inv.-Nr.n RP-P-OB-39.656-9). In contrast, the present copy has beige washes.
"In Siena, Andreani appears in 1586; but even here he must have arrived earlier, if in that year he was able to bring to light the most laborious part of the reproduction of the cathedral floor. Here, as in Rome, he copied in counterpart a Titian print, the one on a single wood known as the Six Saints, attributed to Boldrini from a drawing that Titian himself, according to Vasari, had traced on the wooden matrix, taking it from the lower part of his Madonna di S. Nicolò, which then passed to the Pinacoteca Vaticana, and dedicated it to the Sienese nobleman Fabio Bonsignori. He felt at home in Siena, made many friends there and was happy to be called 'pittor Sanese' and to sign himself 'Intagliatore in Siena', as we read in a half-length Madonna by Casolani that he dedicated in 1591 to another Sienese nobleman, Panfilo Berengucci. In 1588 he published the Allegory of the Death of Giov. Fortunius, also from Siena, and divulged the profile portrait of the fifty-six year old Dürer, deducting it from the well-known German original; in 1589 he dedicated to Bonsignori the copy of another Titian woodcut, the Passaggio del Mar Rosso, published by Domenico delle Greche, 'depentor Veneziano', in 1549. The A. reverses the composition and reduces the twelve plates of the original to four large ones, adding a plane for the illuminated mezzotint, and signs 'Titian inventor, A. A. Intagliator Mantovano'. Titian was always at the forefront of his thoughts, and he would go on to reproduce other works by him, including the famous Diluvio, whose authorship is now questioned by some and which Boldrini had carved in two sheets. But Andreani's greatest effort in Siena was the reproduction of the marble inlays of the cathedral floor: Abraham's sacrifice, Eve after sin, Abel, Moses breaking the tables of the law. For the latter, he seems to have enlisted the help of Francesco Vanni, judging by a drawing preserved in the Uffizi. But there is no mention of this in the print, which saw the light in 1590, with a dedication to Cardinal Scipione Gonzaga. Few four-wood examples of this print are known, while more numerous are those printed with only the outline table' [cf. Alfredo Petrucci, Andrea Andreani - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani - Volume 3 (1961)].
An excellent impression, with the inscription referring to Francesco Vanni at the foot of the Moses still in pen, before the inscription on the plate under the base and before the inscription on the right-hand plate.
The sheet is formerly applied on a stronger laid paper, datable to the 18th century. Tears and small losses in the margins and image, partly repaired with black ink.
A work of great charm and rarity.
Bibliografia
The Illustrated Bartsch vol. 48, I.4-2 (22), p. 16, est. Cat. Grand Scale. Monumental Prints in the Age of Dürer and Titian, a cura di Larry Silver, Wellesley Massachusetts, 2008, pag. 48; Alfredo Petrucci, Andrea Andreani - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani - Volume 3 (1961).
Andrea ANDREANI (Mantova 1546 – 1623)
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Italian woodcutter and printer. He was the only printmaker to produce a significant number of chiaroscuro woodcuts in Italy in the second half of the 16th century; he also reprinted chiaroscuro woodblocks originally cut 60 or 70 years earlier. He made at least 35 prints in both black and white and colour (many multiple-sheet), using a sophisticated style of cutting characterized by thin, closed contours. Based in Florence in 1584–5 and from 1586 in Siena, by 1590 he was also finding work in his native Mantua, where he is documented as establishing a workshop. He reproduced the designs of artists in diverse media with great fidelity: for example he made several prints (1586–90) after Domenico Beccafumi’s intarsia pavement designs in Siena Cathedral, three prints (1584) from different angles of Giambologna’s marble sculpture of the Rape of the Sabines (Florence, Loggia Lanzi), as well as of the bas-relief on the base of the same group and of Giambologna’s relief of Christ before Pilate (Florence, SS Annunziata), both in 1585; in the same year he also made prints after paintings and wash drawings by Jacopo Ligozzi and in 1591–2 others after Alessandro Casolani (1552–1608). His admiration for the woodcuts of Titian’s workshop is evident in his copies of the Triumph of Faith (his only work published in Rome, c. 1600) and Pharaoh Crossing the Red Sea (Siena, 1589) and in his practice of making very large prints composed of many joined sheets. Usually he used four overlapping chiaroscuro blocks per sheet; his most ambitious projects could call for 40 to 52 blocks each, as in the Sacrifice of Isaac (1586) after Beccafumi’s pavement, the Deposition (1595) after Casolani’s painting in S Quirico, Siena, and the Triumph of Caesar (1598–9) based on drawings by Bernardo Malpizzi after Andrea Mantegna’s cartoons (London, Hampton Court, Royal Col.). The fact that Andreani dedicated prints to so many different people, as the inscriptions on his prints show, suggests he had difficulty in finding patrons, though he briefly enjoyed assistance from the Gonzagas. This scarcity of patronage doubtless led to his reprinting, and, where wear or damage required, recutting earlier blocks, probably acquired from Niccolò Vicentino.
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Andrea ANDREANI (Mantova 1546 – 1623)
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Italian woodcutter and printer. He was the only printmaker to produce a significant number of chiaroscuro woodcuts in Italy in the second half of the 16th century; he also reprinted chiaroscuro woodblocks originally cut 60 or 70 years earlier. He made at least 35 prints in both black and white and colour (many multiple-sheet), using a sophisticated style of cutting characterized by thin, closed contours. Based in Florence in 1584–5 and from 1586 in Siena, by 1590 he was also finding work in his native Mantua, where he is documented as establishing a workshop. He reproduced the designs of artists in diverse media with great fidelity: for example he made several prints (1586–90) after Domenico Beccafumi’s intarsia pavement designs in Siena Cathedral, three prints (1584) from different angles of Giambologna’s marble sculpture of the Rape of the Sabines (Florence, Loggia Lanzi), as well as of the bas-relief on the base of the same group and of Giambologna’s relief of Christ before Pilate (Florence, SS Annunziata), both in 1585; in the same year he also made prints after paintings and wash drawings by Jacopo Ligozzi and in 1591–2 others after Alessandro Casolani (1552–1608). His admiration for the woodcuts of Titian’s workshop is evident in his copies of the Triumph of Faith (his only work published in Rome, c. 1600) and Pharaoh Crossing the Red Sea (Siena, 1589) and in his practice of making very large prints composed of many joined sheets. Usually he used four overlapping chiaroscuro blocks per sheet; his most ambitious projects could call for 40 to 52 blocks each, as in the Sacrifice of Isaac (1586) after Beccafumi’s pavement, the Deposition (1595) after Casolani’s painting in S Quirico, Siena, and the Triumph of Caesar (1598–9) based on drawings by Bernardo Malpizzi after Andrea Mantegna’s cartoons (London, Hampton Court, Royal Col.). The fact that Andreani dedicated prints to so many different people, as the inscriptions on his prints show, suggests he had difficulty in finding patrons, though he briefly enjoyed assistance from the Gonzagas. This scarcity of patronage doubtless led to his reprinting, and, where wear or damage required, recutting earlier blocks, probably acquired from Niccolò Vicentino.
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