{"id":5931,"date":"2012-06-21T15:23:25","date_gmt":"2012-06-21T19:23:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.vassar.edu\/rosso\/?page_id=5931"},"modified":"2016-02-16T22:01:50","modified_gmt":"2016-02-17T03:01:50","slug":"rp-04","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/catalogues\/rejected-paintings-sculpture\/rp-04\/","title":{"rendered":"RP.4 Death of Cleopatra"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

RP.4 Death of Cleopatra<\/p><\/div>\n

Braunschweig, Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, no. 479.<\/p>\n

Poplar, 88 x 75.<\/p>\n

Fig.RP.4a<\/a>
\nFig.RP.4b<\/a> bw<\/p>\n

The background drapery is dark green with its fringe behind Cleopatra\u2019s head yellow-orange, red-orange, and green, all dark.\u00a0 Behind her raised arm the background is dark wine red.\u00a0 Cleopatra\u2019s hair is brown; her skin is whitish and greenish, her lips pale.\u00a0 The body probably has a blue-gray underpainting visible at the worn spot at her left nipple.\u00a0 She wears a \u201cgold\u201d earring with a pendant pearl.\u00a0 The drapery under her raised arm is pink-lavender becoming progressively darker in the shadow.\u00a0 The drapery over her lap is dull blue-green with an ochre edge meant perhaps to describe fur.\u00a0 The pillows are yellowish white becoming green with ochre decoration and tassel.\u00a0 The snake is black, brown, and yellow.\u00a0 The carved head at the lower right is brown-orange indicating wood.\u00a0 The attendant has dark blond hair.\u00a0 Her skin is touched with pink.\u00a0 Her drapery is lavender and yellow cangiante.\u00a0 The dark color behind her profile and left arm is blackish, its original color not discernible.\u00a0 Her sash is dark ochre.\u00a0 Franklin recognized a large amount of repainting on Cleopatra\u2019s left shoulder and hip, but thought it was otherwise in excellent condition, although, compared to copies of it (see below), possibly trimmed by about ten centimeters at the top.<\/p>\n

LITERATURE:<\/p>\n

Sabine Jacob and R\u00fcdiger Klessmann, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum Braunschweig, Verzeichnis der Gem\u00e4lde vor 1800<\/em>, Braunschweig, 1976, 34, no. 479, as Italian, c. 1600; acquired or first inventoried in 1710.<\/p>\n

Burton B. Fredericksen, \u201cA New Painting by Rosso Fiorentino,\u201d Scritti di storia dell\u2019arte in onore di Federico Zeri<\/em>, edited by Mauro Natale, I, Milan, 1984, 323-331, as Rosso, 1525-1529, and with earlier bibliography; he recognized a relationship to the ancient statue of the Sleeping Ariadne <\/em>in the Vatican, known since 1512.<\/p>\n

Jacob, Sabine, \u201cFrom Giorgione to Cavallino,\u201d Apollo<\/em>, 123, no. 289, 1986, 186-188, with Fig., as possibly by Rosso, from the Roman period or later, and stylistically similar to the Boston Dead Christ<\/em>; she also indicated that the picture had been attributed to Rosso by Richard Harprath.<\/p>\n

Giovannetti, in Pittura, Cinquecento<\/em>, 1988, II, 826, as Rosso.<\/p>\n

Ciardi and Mugnaini, 1991, 26, 134-135, no. 26, with Color Pl., as probably a copy of a lost painting by Rosso of 1523-1529.<\/p>\n

Franklin, 1994, 148-155, 170, 226, 285, ns. 99-105, Color frontispiece, and Color Pl. 112, as Rosso, and while it cannot with certainty be placed in the Roman period, its style and subject matter firmly place it there, it being closest in style to Rosso\u2019s Roman Dead Christ<\/em> in Boston.<\/p>\n

Burresi, in Rosso e Volterra<\/em>, 1994, 150, under no. 3, as considered an old copy after Rosso.<\/p>\n

Harprath, 1944, 359, as Rosso.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Fredericksen and Jacob pointed out that in 1710 the painting was attributed to Titian, an attribution it still bore in the museum catalogue of 1836.\u00a0 By the mid-nineteenth century it had been attributed to Guido Reni, under whose name it appeared in the catalogue of 1900.\u00a0 The 1922 catalogue recorded Longhi\u2019s suggestion that it is by Poppi.\u00a0 Sabine stated that it has also been attributed to Canlassi, and to anonymous Netherlandish, Florentine, and Bolognese painters of the seventeenth century.\u00a0 In the last catalogue of 1976 it was listed as Italian, around 1600.<\/p>\n

Fredericksen also recorded nine other versions of this picture.\u00a0 The one at Hampton Court (no. 981, on panel, Fredericksen\u2019s Fig. 316; Franklin, 1994, 147, Pl. 111), after being attributed to Ludovico Carracci for a long time, has recently been identified through an inventory of Charles I\u2019s pictures as by the Flemish painter, also active in Naples and Rome, Aert Mytens (Rinaldo Fiammingo, 1541-1601), and as done in Naples (Fig.Aert Mytens, Hampton Court<\/a>).\u00a0 Others have been attributed to Guido Reni (Kassel, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, on canvas, Fredericksen\u2019s Fig. 317; Franklin, 1994, 148), to Furini (Pisa, Museo Nazionale di San Matteo, Fredericksen\u2019s Fig. 318), to Cagnacci (Potsdam, no. GK 2189, on canvas; Franklin, 1994, 148), to \u201cVan Haarlem,\u201d (Christie\u2019s, London, 5 February 1971, lot 38, on canvas, sold to the Arcade Gallery, London), to Frans Floris (Christie\u2019s, Rome, 22 May 1980, on canvas, Fredericksen\u2019s Fig. 319), and again to Mytens (Christie\u2019s, London, 1 August 1975, on canvas).\u00a0 One was thought to be first French and then Bolognese of the seventeenth century (Springfield, Massachusetts, dealer, on canvas, Fredericksen\u2019s Fig. 320); another, transformed into the Magdalen, was considered Flemish, seventeenth century.\u00a0 Franklin, 285, n. 104, notes another copy, brought to his attention by Sabine Jacob, in the Nationalmuseum, Warsaw, inv. no. M.Ob.204 (panel, 102 x 94), and that the image appears in the background of a picture by Job Adriaensz. Berckheyde, dated 1685, offered for sale twice by Christie\u2019s, Monaco (7 December 1987, lot 23; 16 June 1989, lot 27).\u00a0 Fredericksen thought the Braunschweig picture was influential upon Guido Reni\u2019s Penitent Magdalen<\/em>, known from several versions (although he thought the pose of Cleopatra may be dependent upon the Roman Sleeping Ariadne<\/em> in the Vatican from which the Braunschweig figure is also derived), and upon Caravaggio\u2019s Magdalen<\/em> of 1606, known from numerous copies.\u00a0 He also believed to see its influence upon the Venetian Giuseppe Angeli\u2019s Sleeping Shepherdess <\/em>at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, possibly through the many copies that were made of the Braunschweig painting.<\/p>\n

I know only the Braunschweig picture in the original.\u00a0 It is a very fine painting and looks superior to the other five versions that Fredericksen reproduced, however in smaller illustrations (it is also the only reproduced version that seems to show a fur edge to Cleopatra\u2019s garment thrown over her leg).\u00a0 The version that was on the market in Springfield, Massachusetts, is enlarged on all sides, with architecture at the left, and so is clearly a variation of what, from the other pictures, can be considered the original composition.\u00a0 However, it cannot be known now that the Braunschweig painting is the first and original version of this image.\u00a0 It and the Hampton Court painting are on panel, which gives them some priority.\u00a0 The support of the painting in Pisa and the one transformed into the Magdalen are not known.\u00a0 The others are on canvas.<\/p>\n

From the Braunschweig painting, and from the reproductions of the other four very similar versions, the Death of Cleopatra<\/em> does not appear to me to be by Rosso.\u00a0 Fredericksen wanted to see it as related to Rosso\u2019s Dead Christ<\/em> in Boston (Fig.P.18a<\/a>) and to his Piet\u00e0<\/em> in Borgo Sansepolcro (Fig.P.19a<\/a>).\u00a0 But the resemblances seem to me superficial.\u00a0 Fundamentally, Rosso\u2019s pictures are composed planarly, with major planes parallel to the picture plane and secondary planes perpendicular or at a forty-five degree angle to it.\u00a0 The Braunschweig picture is conceived with its forms existing totally and continually in space.\u00a0 There are no angular relationships of planes of form or of light and shade.\u00a0 In fact, the light and shade resolve the lateral and receding planes of the picture.\u00a0 Furthermore, the decorative elements of Rosso\u2019s pictures form a network of almost brittle ornament.\u00a0 In the Death of Cleopatra<\/em> the clarity of details is reduced to resolve them as well into the spatial continuum of the composition.\u00a0 The Braunschweig picture is a considerably later creation.<\/p>\n

If the version at Hampton Court is by Mytens then it was done possibly as early as 1557 or shortly thereafter or in the 1580s or early 1590s when he was in Naples.\u00a0 Except for the old attribution of the Braunschweig painting to Titian and Longhi\u2019s suggestion of Poppi, this picture and all of the other versions of it have always been thought to have been done in the seventeenth century, although the former attribution of the Hampton Court painting to Ludovico Carracci could have implied a date in the last two decades of the sixteenth century.\u00a0 J. Richard Judson suggested to me, albeit hesitantly, that it could be by a Northern maniera artist, perhaps even a German one in the area of Hans van Aachen.\u00a0 The Death of Cleopatra<\/em> seems not to be by an Italian, although it could have been painted in Italy.\u00a0 Only the decorative head in the lower right corner suggests a connection with Rosso, and with Rosso in France, but by the time this painting was done in the latter part of the sixteenth century (or in the seventeenth century), such a detail could have been obtained from a number of sources, especially prints.\u00a0 I do not see a particularly close relation to the ancient Sleeping Ariadne<\/em> in the Vatican, as recognized by Fredericksen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Braunschweig, Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, no. 479. Poplar, 88 x 75. Fig.RP.4a Fig.RP.4b bw The background drapery is dark green with its fringe behind Cleopatra\u2019s head yellow-orange, red-orange, and green, all dark.\u00a0 Behind her raised arm the background is dark wine red.\u00a0 Cleopatra\u2019s hair is brown; her skin is whitish and greenish, her lips pale.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"parent":1357,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-5931","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5931"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11841,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5931\/revisions\/11841"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/rosso\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}