In this ongoing series for Fine Art Today, we take a longer look at the history and features of a soon-to-be-available artwork of note. This week we feature a highlight of Sotheby’s upcoming “Old Masters” Sale.
Although he is a rather obscure 16th-century Venetian painter, Giovanni Galizzi features beautifully during Sotheby’s May 3 “Old Masters” sale in London. Through the adroit research of Professor Peter Humfrey and Robert Echols, “The Holy Family with Mary Magdalene” has been attributed to Galizzi and not Bonifacio de’Pitati, as was previously believed.
As its title suggests, the painting displays four figures: Mary, Joseph, Christ, and Mary Magdalene. Set against a lush landscape, the figures all gaze toward the infant Christ, who — in turn — gestures back towards the Virgin. “The treatment here of the drapery over the Madonna’s bust, and the rendering of her pose, is particularly comparable to the Madonna in Galizzi’s Adoration of the Magi, executed toward the end of the 1540s,” Sotheby’s writes. “The overall composition, however, is more Bellinesque and in keeping with his Sacra Conversazione ‘types’ produced in the earlier years of that decade.”
Auction estimates are between $36,000 and $61,000. To learn more, visit Sotheby’s.
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