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| Keywords: Sandro Botticelli - The Adoration of the Magi - Google Art Project.jpg Google Art Project Q3201474 Creator Sandro Botticelli other date ca 1478 1482 oil poplar cm 68 102 Gallery 07 Andrew W Mellon Collection Italy Florence 1446 Italy Florence 1510 Sandro male 717620 Botticelli Italian 1446 - 1510 /collection/national-gallery-of-art-washington-dc/artwork/the-adoration-of-the-magi-sandro-botticelli/716700/ 24 Sandro Botticelli painter /artist/sandro-botticelli/4128053/ 4128053 /collection/national-gallery-of-art-washington-dc/ National Gallery of Art Washington DC 507112 http //www nga gov/ 1/25/2012 9 58 54 PM /collection/national-gallery-of-art-washington-dc/artwork/the-adoration-of-the-magi-sandro-botticelli/716700/ 1478 c 1478 Florentine New Testament Life of Christ tempera and oil on panel Probably commissioned by a member of the Medici family Florence; by inheritance to Lorenzo de' Medici 1449 1492 Florence 1 probably Marchese Piero Guicciardini 1569 1626; his widow Marchesa Simona Machiavelli 1584 1658 Florence;2 by inheritance to her great nephew Count Francesco Guicciardini 1618 1677 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Lorenzo Guicciardini 1652 1710 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Francesco Gaetano Guicciardini 1699 1780 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Lorenzo Guicciardini 1743 1812 Florence; by inheritance to his sons Count Francesco 1776 1838 and Colonel Ferdinando 1782 1833 Guicciardini Florence in 1803;3 sold July 1810 to Chevalier François Honoré Dubois Florence and Paris as by Botticelli 4 Samuel Woodburn London by 1826 as by Fra Angelico 5 William Coningham 1815 1884 London; his sale Christie Manson London 9 June 1849 no 34 as by Filippo Lippi 6 Alexander Barker d 1873 London by 1851;7 his sale Christie Manson Woods London 6 June 1874 no 42 as by Filippino Lippi ;8 purchased by Giovanni Calvetti d 1875 London for Sir Francis Cook 1st bt 1817 1901 Doughty House Richmond Surrey; by inheritance to his son Sir Frederick Lucas Cook 2nd bt 1844 1920 Doughty House; by inheritance to his son Sir Herbert Frederick Cook 3rd bt 1868 1939 Doughty House; by inheritance to his son Sir Francis Ferdinand Maurice Cook 4th bt 1907 1978 Doughty House and Cothay Manor Somerset; sold February 1947 through Francis A Drey London to the Samuel H Kress Foundation New York as by Filippo Lippi;9 gift 1952 to NGA 1 The inventory drawn up after the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent is known today from a copy made on 23 December 1512 in the Archivio di Stato in Florence; see E Müntz <i>Les Collections des Médicis au XVe siècle</i> Paris and London 1888 60 fol 6 of the manuscript Nella chamera grande terrena detta chamera di Lorenzo uno tondo grande la nostra Donna e nostro Signore e e' Magi che vanno a offerire di mano di fra Giovanni f 100 In the large ground floor bedroom called Lorenzo's bedroom a large tondo our Lady and our Lord and the Magi who come to bring offerings from the hand of Fra Giovanni f 100 The high value assigned to the panel considering that the three famous panels of the <i>Battle of San Romano</i> by Paolo Uccello as well as two other paintings by Uccello and a sixth by Pesellino all in that same room were estimated as worth 300 florins collectively leads us to believe that the painting described was compositionally quite elaborate; this offers some albeit slender evidence for identifying the Medici tondo as NGA 1952 2 2 2 The Washington tondo and another tondo of the same subject now in the National Gallery London are apparently recorded in an inventory verified on 20 April 1643 by Simona Machiavelli the widow of Piero Guicciardini and confirmed by her great nephew Francesco Guicciardini on 31 July 1665 Archivio Guicciardini filza XLIV ins 7 In Valentina Fallani's study of Piero's important collection of paintings Valentina Fallani Piero Guicciardini e la sua quadreria fidecommissaria nella Firenze medicea del Seicento diss Università degli Studi di Firenze 1992 the inventory is transcribed 172 185 and hypothesized to be a record of the paintings Piero entailed on his heirs 99 The dimensions given for two round paintings depicting the Adoration of the Magi 2 2/3 and 3 1/3 braccia somewhat exceed those of the Washington and London pictures but the discrepancy is probably due to the inclusion of the frames which are described in the measurements as suggested in a letter from Burton Fredericksen to Nicholas Penny of 14 August 2000 copy in NGA curatorial files An undated inventory made sometime after the 1658 death of Simona Machiavelli seems to record the Washington painting specifically Adorazione de' Magi in tondo del beato Giovanni Angelico domenicano Adoration of the Magi a tondo by the Blessed Giovanni Angelico Dominican Archivio Guicciardinni filza XLIV ins 5; transcribed in Fallani Piero Guicciardini 187 189 The tondi stayed together and the memory of their Guicciardini provenance remained alive until the middle of the nineteenth century when they become convincingly identifiable with the Washington and London tondi see notes 4 and 5 If Piero did own the Washington picture it could have passed from the Medici to the Guicciardini through Piero's father Agnolo 1506 1581 who had close ties to the Medici personal communication from Valentina Fallani to Elon Danziger 13 April 2002 For a complete reconstruction of the early history of the painting see Elon Danziger Round Pictures of the Adoration of the Magi from Early Renaissance Florence <i>Association for Art History Newsletter</i> 2 no 2 spring 2002 5 7 3 According to Paolo Guicciardini <i>Cusona</i> 2 vols Florence 1939 1 295 Francesco and Ferdinando were emancipati and given possession of their inheritance in 1803 while their parents were still living 4 An inventory of the Guicciardini gallery dated 1 September 1807 Archivio Guicciardini filza XXXV seconda n 5; transcribed in Gino Corti Due quadrerie in Firenze la collezione Lorenzi prima metà del Settecento e la collezione Guicciardini 1807 <i>Paragone</i> 35 no 417 November 1984 94 101 and in Fallani 1992 239 243 was transformed into a bill of sale when M Dubois bought the entire contents at about two thirds assessed value in July 1810 The two tondi were valued at 50 zecchini each Certain unusual paintings from the Guicciardini gallery reappear at a 17 and 18 March 1813 Paris auction of paintings owned by Dubois commissaire de la police à Florence allowing a more precise identification of the tondi's buyer Police commissioner for Napoleonic Florence until 1811 Dubois left behind many letters valuable for the history of Florence under French dominion His title and name are found in Duane Koenig's The Napoleonic Regime in Tuscany 1807 1814 Ph D diss University of Wisconsin 1942 93 5 Burton Fredericksen has discovered a 25 March 1826 private treaty sale catalogue of the stock of Messrs Woodburn copies in the Bodleian Library Oxford; Royal Library Brussels; and Bibliothèque de l'art et d'archéologie Paris It includes two Adoration of the Magi tondi both with a Guicciardini provenance attributed to Fra Angelico no 1 and Botticelli no 2 with diameters nearly identical to those of the Washington and London pictures They probably went unsold since as Fredericksen points out letter to David Alan Brown 11 July 2000 in NGA curatorial files J D Passavant mentions older pictures by Fiesole Sandro Botticelli and others that he had seen in the Woodburn gallery in 1831 Johann David Passavant <i>Kunstreise durch England und Belgien</i> Frankfurt am Main 1833 113 and English ed <i>Tour of a German Artist in England</i> 2 vols London 1836 I 250 ; these were probably the tondi since Fredericksen continues works by either artist were very rare on the London market at this time Fredericksen speculates that since Woodburn indicates in the introduction of the catalogue that almost all of the paintings in it had been acquired during recent trips to Italy France and Holland the two tondi may well have been acquired directly from Dubois He also suggests that Coningham bought them directly from Samuel Woodburn sometime thereafter since Woodburn regularly advised Coningham on his purchases 6 The Wise Men of the East offering their Presents to the Infant Christ in the lap of the Virgin who is seated before a wooden building with numerous figures around From the Guicciardini Palace in Florence Fra Filippo Lippi is suggested as the author The sale also included the other Guicciardini tondo no 38 which was attributed to Filippino Lippi a reference that makes it almost certain that the panel is to be identified as Martin Davies thought with Botticelli's tondo no 1033 in the London National Gallery Martin Davies <i>National Gallery Catalogues The Earlier Italian Schools</i> 2nd rev ed London 1961 102 note 7 7 In Gustav Friedrich Waagen <i>Treasures of Art in Great Britain</i> 3 vols London 1854 2 125 a compilation of paintings seen on 1850 and 1851 visits to England the author describes a painting in Barker's collection that he attributes to Benozzo Gozzoli as a very rich circular composition and one of the finest specimens of the early time of this great master Several distinctive aspects point to the Washington tondo it breathes the purity and intensity of religious feeling which distinguished Gozzoli's master Fiesole Fra Angelico ; Gozzoli's originality is seen in many an animated action and also in the rich accessories ; there are two peacocks somewhat too large in proportion Although what Waagen took for a second peacock is actually two pheasants the disproportion between the birds and their surroundings in the Washington painting and more importantly the picture's close affinities with Angelico's late activity and therefore the artistic milieu of Gozzoli's beginnings are in accord with the characteristics of the work described by Waagen Moreover as Waagen specifies the Barker Adoration was formerly in the collection of Mr Coningham The other Coningham tondo seen and described by Waagen <i>Treasures</i> 1854 3 3 in the collection of W Fuller Maitland at Stansted Hall as a work by Filippino Lippi is the London Botticelli acquired from Maitland's son in 1878 8 Some confusion has been caused by the fact that the 1874 Barker sale catalogue includes two tondi representing the Adoration of the Magi that are described in a very similar manner no 44 is attributed to Filippo Lippi and no 42 to Filippino but both are claimed to contain portraits of the Accajuoli sic family As NGA 1952 2 2 was bought by Sir Francis Cook through his agent at this very sale and Tancred Borenius <i>A Catalogue of the Paintings at Doughty House Richmond Elsewhere in the Collection of Sir Frederick Cook Bt I Italian Schools</i> London 1913 21 specifies that the panel was lot 42 there is no serious reason to doubt his assertion in spite of the alleged Acciaiuoli portraits Actually the Washington <i>Adoration</i> does not seem to contain any portrait but this claim derives very likely from a confusion with no 44 of the Barker sale probably the Domenico Venziano tondo in the Berlin Gemäldegalerie no 95A That painting reappeared in the 1879 Barker sale as noted in the London <i>Times</i> 23 June 1879 12 which gives the diameter and 1874 sale price proving the identification of lot 44 with the Berlin tondo In Domenico's painting two of the Magi as well as several members of their retinue appear to be portraits and it is quite possible that this panel was owned sometime earlier by the Acciaiuoli family 9 Before World War II the most important paintings from the Cook collection were sent to the United States for safekeeping They were exhibited at the Toledo Ohio Museum of Art from 1944 to 1945 and at two museums in Canada in 1945 After complicated negotiations on the eve of the paintings' return to England the Kress Foundation purchased a number of works including NGA 1952 2 2 See copies of correspondence in NGA curatorial files from the Cook Collection Archive in care of John Somerville England 700 716700 False 1482 1482 overall size 3/24/2012 9 31 20 AM 1937 1 22 http //www nga gov/fcgi-bin/timage_f object 24 National Gallery of Art Washington DC Andrew W Mellon Collection Painting 1470 1490 w1042 x h700 cm c 1478 - 1482 False 1 50146627565982 Object the-adoration-of-the-magi-sandro-botticelli The Adoration of the Magi a 1042 tempera and oil on panel Probably commissioned by a member of the Medici family Florence; by inheritance to Lorenzo de' Medici 1449 1492 Florence <ref>The inventory drawn up after the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent is known today from a copy made on 23 December 1512 in the Archivio di Stato in Florence; see E Müntz <i>Les Collections des Médicis au XVe siècle</i> Paris and London 1888 60 fol 6 of the manuscript Nella chamera grande terrena detta chamera di Lorenzo uno tondo grande la nostra Donna e nostro Signore e e' Magi che vanno a offerire di mano di fra Giovanni f 100 In the large ground floor bedroom called Lorenzo's bedroom a large tondo our Lady and our Lord and the Magi who come to bring offerings from the hand of Fra Giovanni f 100 The high value assigned to the panel considering that the three famous panels of the <i>Battle of San Romano</i> by Paolo Uccello as well as two other paintings by Uccello and a sixth by Pesellino all in that same room were estimated as worth 300 florins collectively leads us to believe that the painting described was compositionally quite elaborate; this offers some albeit slender evidence for identifying the Medici tondo as NGA 1952 2 2 </ref><br/>probably Marchese Piero Guicciardini 1569 1626; his widow Marchesa Simona Machiavelli 1584 1658 Florence;<ref>The Washington tondo and another tondo of the same subject now in the National Gallery London are apparently recorded in an inventory verified on 20 April 1643 by Simona Machiavelli the widow of Piero Guicciardini and confirmed by her great nephew Francesco Guicciardini on 31 July 1665 Archivio Guicciardini filza XLIV ins 7 In Valentina Fallani's study of Piero's important collection of paintings Valentina Fallani Piero Guicciardini e la sua quadreria fidecommissaria nella Firenze medicea del Seicento diss Università degli Studi di Firenze 1992 the inventory is transcribed 172 185 and hypothesized to be a record of the paintings Piero entailed on his heirs 99 The dimensions given for two round paintings depicting the Adoration of the Magi 2 2/3 and 3 1/3 braccia somewhat exceed those of the Washington and London pictures but the discrepancy is probably due to the inclusion of the frames which are described in the measurements as suggested in a letter from Burton Fredericksen to Nicholas Penny of 14 August 2000 copy in NGA curatorial files An undated inventory made sometime after the 1658 death of Simona Machiavelli seems to record the Washington painting specifically Adorazione de' Magi in tondo del beato Giovanni Angelico domenicano Adoration of the Magi a tondo by the Blessed Giovanni Angelico Dominican Archivio Guicciardinni filza XLIV ins 5; transcribed in Fallani Piero Guicciardini 187 189 The tondi stayed together and the memory of their Guicciardini provenance remained alive until the middle of the nineteenth century when they become convincingly identifiable with the Washington and London tondi see notes 4 and 5 If Piero did own the Washington picture it could have passed from the Medici to the Guicciardini through Piero's father Agnolo 1506 1581 who had close ties to the Medici personal communication from Valentina Fallani to Elon Danziger 13 April 2002 For a complete reconstruction of the early history of the painting see Elon Danziger Round Pictures of the Adoration of the Magi from Early Renaissance Florence <i>Association for Art History Newsletter</i> 2 no 2 spring 2002 5 7 </ref><br/>by inheritance to her great nephew Count Francesco Guicciardini 1618 1677 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Lorenzo Guicciardini 1652 1710 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Francesco Gaetano Guicciardini 1699 1780 Florence; by inheritance to his son Count Lorenzo Guicciardini 1743 1812 Florence; by inheritance to his sons Count Francesco 1776 1838 and Colonel Ferdinando 1782 1833 Guicciardini Florence in 1803<ref>According to Paolo Guicciardini <i>Cusona</i> 2 vols Florence 1939 1 295 Francesco and Ferdinando were emancipati and given possession of their inheritance in 1803 while their parents were still living </ref><br/>sold July 1810 to Chevalier François Honoré Dubois Florence and Paris as by Botticelli <ref>An inventory of the Guicciardini gallery dated 1 September 1807 Archivio Guicciardini filza XXXV seconda n 5; transcribed in Gino Corti Due quadrerie in Firenze la collezione Lorenzi prima metà del Settecento e la collezione Guicciardini 1807 <i>Paragone</i> 35 no 417 November 1984 94 101 and in Fallani 1992 239 243 was transformed into a bill of sale when M Dubois bought the entire contents at about two thirds assessed value in July 1810 The two tondi were valued at 50 zecchini each Certain unusual paintings from the Guicciardini gallery reappear at a 17 and 18 March 1813 Paris auction of paintings owned by Dubois commissaire de la police à Florence allowing a more precise identification of the tondi's buyer Police commissioner for Napoleonic Florence until 1811 Dubois left behind many letters valuable for the history of Florence under French dominion His title and name are found in Duane Koenig's The Napoleonic Regime in Tuscany 1807 1814 Ph D diss University of Wisconsin 1942 93 </ref><br/> Samuel Woodburn London by 1826 as by Fra Angelico <ref>Burton Fredericksen has discovered a 25 March 1826 private treaty sale catalogue of the stock of Messrs Woodburn copies in the Bodleian Library Oxford; Royal Library Brussels; and Bibliothèque de l'art et d'archéologie Paris It includes two Adoration of the Magi tondi both with a Guicciardini provenance attributed to Fra Angelico no 1 and Botticelli no 2 with diameters nearly identical to those of the Washington and London pictures They probably went unsold since as Fredericksen points out letter to David Alan Brown 11 July 2000 in NGA curatorial files J D Passavant mentions older pictures by Fiesole Sandro Botticelli and others that he had seen in the Woodburn gallery in 1831 Johann David Passavant <i>Kunstreise durch England und Belgien</i> Frankfurt am Main 1833 113 and English ed <i>Tour of a German Artist in England</i> 2 vols London 1836 I 250 ; these were probably the tondi since Fredericksen continues works by either artist were very rare on the London market at this time Fredericksen speculates that since Woodburn indicates in the introduction of the catalogue that almost all of the paintings in it had been acquired during recent trips to Italy France and Holland the two tondi may well have been acquired directly from Dubois He also suggests that Coningham bought them directly from Samuel Woodburn sometime thereafter since Woodburn regularly advised Coningham on his purchases </ref><br/>William Coningham 1815 1884 London; his sale Christie Manson London 9 June 1849 no 34 as by Filippo Lippi <ref> The Wise Men of the East offering their Presents to the Infant Christ in the lap of the Virgin who is seated before a wooden building with numerous figures around From the Guicciardini Palace in Florence Fra Filippo Lippi is suggested as the author The sale also included the other Guicciardini tondo no 38 which was attributed to Filippino Lippi a reference that makes it almost certain that the panel is to be identified as Martin Davies thought with Botticelli's tondo no 1033 in the London National Gallery Martin Davies <i>National Gallery Catalogues The Earlier Italian Schools</i> 2nd rev ed London 1961 102 note 7 </ref><br/> Alexander Barker d 1873 London by 1851<ref>In Gustav Friedrich Waagen <i>Treasures of Art in Great Britain</i> 3 vols London 1854 2 125 a compilation of paintings seen on 1850 and 1851 visits to England the author describes a painting in Barker's collection that he attributes to Benozzo Gozzoli as a very rich circular composition and one of the finest specimens of the early time of this great master Several distinctive aspects point to the Washington tondo it breathes the purity and intensity of religious feeling which distinguished Gozzoli's master Fiesole Fra Angelico ; Gozzoli's originality is seen in many an animated action and also in the rich accessories ; there are two peacocks somewhat too large in proportion Although what Waagen took for a second peacock is actually two pheasants the disproportion between the birds and their surroundings in the Washington painting and more importantly the picture's close affinities with Angelico's late activity and therefore the artistic milieu of Gozzoli's beginnings are in accord with the characteristics of the work described by Waagen Moreover as Waagen specifies the Barker Adoration was formerly in the collection of Mr Coningham The other Coningham tondo seen and described by Waagen <i>Treasures</i> 1854 3 3 in the collection of W Fuller Maitland at Stansted Hall as a work by Filippino Lippi is the London Botticelli acquired from Maitland's son in 1878 </ref><br/> his sale Christie Manson Woods London 6 June 1874 no 42 as by Filippino Lippi ;<ref>Some confusion has been caused by the fact that the 1874 Barker sale catalogue includes two tondi representing the Adoration of the Magi that are described in a very similar manner no 44 is attributed to Filippo Lippi and no 42 to Filippino but both are claimed to contain portraits of the Accajuoli sic family As NGA 1952 2 2 was bought by Sir Francis Cook through his agent at this very sale and Tancred Borenius <i>A Catalogue of the Paintings at Doughty House Richmond Elsewhere in the Collection of Sir Frederick Cook Bt I Italian Schools</i> London 1913 21 specifies that the panel was lot 42 there is no serious reason to doubt his assertion in spite of the alleged Acciaiuoli portraits Actually the Washington <i>Adoration</i> does not seem to contain any portrait but this claim derives very likely from a confusion with no 44 of the Barker sale probably the Domenico Venziano tondo in the Berlin Gemäldegalerie no 95A That painting reappeared in the 1879 Barker sale as noted in the London <i>Times</i> 23 June 1879 12 which gives the diameter and 1874 sale price proving the identification of lot 44 with the Berlin tondo In Domenico's painting two of the Magi as well as several members of their retinue appear to be portraits and it is quite possible that this panel was owned sometime earlier by the Acciaiuoli family </ref><br/>purchased by Giovanni Calvetti d 1875 London for Sir Francis Cook 1st bt 1817 1901 Doughty House Richmond Surrey; by inheritance to his son Sir Frederick Lucas Cook 2nd bt 1844 1920 Doughty House; by inheritance to his son Sir Herbert Frederick Cook 3rd bt 1868 1939 Doughty House; by inheritance to his son Sir Francis Ferdinand Maurice Cook 4th bt 1907 1978 Doughty House and Cothay Manor Somerset; sold February 1947 through Francis A Drey London to the Samuel H Kress Foundation New York as by Filippo Lippi<ref>Before World War II the most important paintings from the Cook collection were sent to the United States for safekeeping They were exhibited at the Toledo Ohio Museum of Art from 1944 to 1945 and at two museums in Canada in 1945 After complicated negotiations on the eve of the paintings' return to England the Kress Foundation purchased a number of works including NGA 1952 2 2 See copies of correspondence in NGA curatorial files from the Cook Collection </ref><br/>gift 1952 to NGA <small> reflist </small> Florentine New Testament Life of Christ special url_id FgG_GBvQpQHgtQ PD-old-100-1923 DEFAULTSORT Botticelli; Adoration of the Magi; NGA Google Art Project works by Sandro Botticelli Adoration of the Magi by Botticelli Washington | ||||
