Lot 11

Private collection, c. 1900
Thence by descent
Bonhams, London, Old Master Paintings, 4 July 2012, lot 24
where presumably purchased by Robert Compton Jones

Attribution was confirmed by Professor Alessandro Ballarin prior to the Bonhams auction on the basis of a colour photograph.

RELATED WORK:
Battista Dossi, The Holy Family with the Infant St. John the Baptist c.1530, oil on panel, 58.9 x 38.9cm, Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill, North Carolina USA.

Battista Dossi and Dosso Dossi, Votive Nativity with God the Father (Adoration of the Child), oil on panel, 243 x 165cm, Estense Gallery of Modena, inv. RCGE 440

LOT ESSAY:
The present lot by Battista Dossi presents a vividly coloured Nativity scene, illustrating the rich palette and atmospheric landscape characteristic of 16th-century painting in Ferrara. At the centre in the foreground the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph gaze upon the infant Christ. They are surrounded by four shepherds, two kneeling to the right and two standing to the left. Overhead four angels soar and God the Father emerges from the clouds to bless the newborn child.

Battista was the younger brother of Dosso Dossi, a court painter in Ferrara who was considered a supreme master at depicting the natural world. From 1514 to 1542, Dosso Dossi served as court painter to dukes Alfonso I and Ercole II d'Este and played a critical role in defining the character of Ferrarese painting. Battista's early career is more difficult to trace than that of his brother's. First recorded in 1517 as painting theatrical masks, he briefly joined Raphael's workshop in Rome in 1520 before joining his brother's workshop. The precise date that he joined Dosso's workshop is unknown but it is clear that by the end of the 1520s he was assuming an increasing number of responsibilities in the running of the shop and playing an increasingly significant role in the execution of Dosso's pictures. As such, scholars remain divided when it comes to assessing the extent of Battista's participation in any specific example of Dosso's later work or in identifying independent works by Battista whilst his brother was living. This is largely due to how frequently the brothers collaborated and the difficulty in definitively distinguishing one hand from the other. For example, the pair collaborated extensively on a pair of altarpieces commissioned by Duke Alfonso in 1533 to celebrate the return of the cities Reggio and Modena to Este rule. Recorded payments for those altarpieces were made only to Dosso, however, when the Votive Nativity with God the Father was installed in Modena Cathedral in 1536 (now in the Pinoteco Estense, Modena, fig. 9) the local chronicler Lancellotti specified that it had been executed by "M… Fratello de M. Dosso" (brother of Dosso). The composition of this painting was compared to the present lot by Professor Alessandro Ballarin in his confirmation of the attribution of the present lot to Battista. Ballarin and Peter Humfrey both attribute the Votive Nativity in Modena to Battista, albeit with different execution dates.(1)

We know that by 1530, Battista had begun executing large-scale independent works, such as the Portomaggiore altarpiece, and his increasing managerial role in the workshop suggests a growing artistic autonomy. Battista's style produced qualities of its own distinct to his brother's and at his best he was considered capable of producing work of considerable originality and fascination.(2)

Another comparable work that, whilst occasionally attributed to Dosso, has been attributed to Battista by both Ballarin and Humfrey is The Holy Family with the Infant St. John the Baptist, in the Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill.(3) The familiar motif of the large sun emerging from the clouds derives from similarly dramatic celestial phenomena in Dosso's work, yet certain other features are entirely characteristic of Battista. Among them, Peter Humfrey mentions the "gold fringes on the Child's sheet, Joseph's hair and beard (…) rendered with exceptional delicacy (...) The scroll held by the angel on the right bears the opening words of the angelic hymn to the Nativity of Christ, "Gloria in Excelsis Deo"."(4) Peter Humfrey also mentions that of particular note is the geometric subdivision of the background between dark elements to the left and a bright distant landscape on the right. We can see many similarities in composition and form in the present lot.

Madeleine Mackenzie

(1) Humfrey, P., and Lucco, L.,, Dosso Dossi, Court Painter in Renaissance Ferrara, New York, 1998, no. 51, p. 253-55, ill, p. 254; A. Ballarin, Dosso Dossi: La Pittura a Ferrara negli anni del ducato di Alfonso I (Cittadella, 1994), fig. CXXIX.
(2) Humfrey, P., and Lucco, L., 1998, p.249
(3) Humfrey, P., and Lucco, L., 1998, p.253
(4) ibid