Amnon and Tamar

Details

Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, il Guercino (Cento 1591-1666 Bologna)
Amnon and Tamar
oil on canvas
43¼ x 60 7/8 in. (109.8 x 154.5 cm.)

Provenance

Commissioned by Aurelio Zanoletti of Reggio, but sold by the artist on 28 January 1650 to Girolamo Bavoso or Bavosi, who sent the picture to Venice (see note below).
Presumably the Guercino of this subject sold by Pierre Berton, French agent in Rome, to William Fauquier in 1742 (see note below).
Private collection, Ireland.
Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 18 December 1980, lot 14.
with Wildenstein, New York.
Frederick W. Field, Greenacres, Beverly Hills; Christie's, London, 5 July 1991, lot 19.
with Sarina Tang Fine Art Gallery, New York, from whom acquired by the present owner in 1993.

Literature

G.F. Barbieri, il Guercino, Libro dei conti, MS, Biblioteca Comunale dell'Archiginnasio di Bologna, inv. B 331, p. 37 recto, conto 419, 'il di 28 Genaro - Nel Medemo Giorno si è riceuto dal Sig:re Girolamo Bauosos Ducatoni n:o 115 per il quadro del Amnone e tamar, in storia Cauara della S.ra Sritura è questi furno doble di Italia in tuto il pagamento n:o 174- Scudi 143 L 3- che fano poi in tuto L 2575.4 Scudi 643 L3 è ducatoni in tuto fano à L 5 la soma di 515'.
Count C.C. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice: Vite de Pittori Bolognesi, Bologna, 1678, II, p. 376; 2nd ed., with notes by G. Zanotti, Bologna, 1841, II, pp. 267 and 330 (the entry from Guercino's Libro dei conti).
J.A. Calvi, Notizie della vita e delle opere del Cavalier Giovan Francesco Barbieri detto il Guercino da Cento, Bologna, 1808, p. 123 (the first publication of Guercino's Libro dei conti, reprinted in the second edition of Malvasia).
F. Russell, 'Dr Clephane, John Blackwood and Batoni's "Sacrifice of Iphigenia"', The Burlington Magazine, CXXVII, December 1985, p. 892 and note 24.
L. Salerno and D. Mahon, I Dipinti del Guercino, Rome, 1988, pp. 332-333, under nos. 261-262, and p. 334, no. 263.
D. Mahon, ed., Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, il Guercino, 1591-1666, exhibition catalogue, Museo Civico Archeologico, Bologna; Pinacoteca Civica e Chiesa del Rosario, Cento; Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt am Main; and National Gallery of Art, Washington; Bologna, 1991, pp. 318-319.
D.M. Stone, Guercino: Catalogo completo dei dipinti, Florence, 1991, pp. 255-257, no. 247.
B. Ghelfi, ed., with D. Mahon, Il libro dei conti del Guercino, 1629-1666, Venice, 1997, p. 145, no. 419.
R.E. Spear, ed., Seeing Double: Two Versions of Guercino's 'Joseph and Potiphar's Wife', Gainesville, 1999, fig. 9.

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Lot Essay

Malvasia records among Guercino's works of 1649 'Un Gioseffo fuggitivo dalla moglie di Putifar al Sig. Aurelio Zanoletti; & al medemoun quadro con Amnone, quando discaccia la violata Tamar. Questo quadro fù ceduto al Sig. Girolamo Bavosi, che l'inviò a Venetia con un altro di Apollo di Dafne' -- Sir Denis Mahon was the first to recognize, before the 1980 sale, that this reference must relate to the present picture. Ghelfi notes that this is the first treatment of the subject by Guercino (loc. cit.). An entry of 28 January 1649 in Guercino's Libro dei conti records receipt of payment from Bavosi. Another entry of 10 March 1649 refers to the later painting of this Old Testament subject by Guercino, which hangs with its pendant Joseph and Potiphar's wife, in the National Gallery of Art, Washington.

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