Flagellation of Christ
(Garofalo or Ferrara 1476 - Ferrara 1559)
This painting was part of the group belonging to Lucrezia d'Este and inherited by Olimpia Aldobrandini, wife of Paolo Borghese. The compositional structure of the work, based on the rigid frontal symmetry of the figures in relation to the central architectural element, lends the scene a theatrical air. The balance of Christ’s body is forced and the poses of his two tormentors are studied and unnatural. The resulting atmosphere likens the painting to a few contemporary works by Mazzolino, the influence of whom is also found in the slightly grotesque character of some of the figures. The painting has recently been attributed also to the Ferrara painter Domenico Mona (Ferrara, c. 1550–Parma, c. 1602).
Object details
Inventory
Location
Date
Classification
Period
Medium
Dimensions
Provenance
Borghese collection, documented in Inv. 1693, room VIII, no. 414; Inventory 1790, room X, no. 6; Inventory Fidecommissario Borghese 1833, p. 13. Purchased by the Italian state, 1902.
Exhibitions
- 1998, Modena, Gallerie Estensi
- 2008, Ferrara, Castello Estense
Conservation and Diagnostic
- 1978 Gianluigi Colalucci
- 2002 Andrea Parri (frame)
- 2020 Measure3D di Danilo Salzano (laser scan 3D)
- 2020 Erredicci (diagnostics)
- 2020 IFAC-CNR (diagnostics)
- 2020 ArsMensurae di Stefano Ridolfi (diagnostics)
Commentary
Recently attributed to the artist Domenico Mona (Ferrara, c. 1550–Parma, c. 1602; Herrmann Fiore 2002) based on the inventory of Lucrezia d’Este d’Urbino, which describes a painting ‘of Our Lord beaten on the column, painted by Mona with a carved gilt frame’, the work was nevertheless in all probability made by Garofalo between the late 1520s and the early 1530s (Danieli 2008). Although we know from the sources that Mona also worked as a copyist, this painting entirely lacks the unique features that would allow us to identify it as his work, specifically, and especially at the time when the inventory of the still-living Este noblewoman was drawn up, a thick application of paint reminiscent of Tintoretto and Bassano’s workshop, as opposed to the more classical style of Garofalo, expressed here in the graceful, sinuous proportions and heavily classicising architectural setting, drawn in particular from the designs by Raphael engraved by Marcantonio Raimondi.
Christ, leaning against a column between the two round arches of a classical building, is bathed in a strong light and gently blown by a breeze that uncovers his tidily bearded face and ruffles the drapery wrapped around his hips. In front of the architectural structure, which balances an inside space on the right covered with a cloth and an open space on the left hosting three bystanders and revealing a typically Ferrarese landscape in the background, are the two brutes who are about to start beating the as-yet untouched body of Christ.
The painting has been variously dated based on stylistic analysis: initially considered a ‘rather late’ work (Della Pergola 1955), it was then dated to 1527-1528 (Fioravanti Baraldi 1977; idem, 1993) based on comparison with the Annunciation in the Pinacoteca Capitolina that had been in the Pio Collection (inv. PC 5; Guarino in Pinacoteca Capitolina. Catalogo generale 2006, n. 24), and then still earlier to 1519, considering some similarities with the Massacre of the Innocents painted for the church of San Francesco in Ferrara and now in the Pinacoteca Nazionale (inv. PNFe 161), especially the strong influence of Raphael by way of the same composition engraved by Raimondi (Danieli 2008).
Lara Scanu
Bibliography
- M. Vasi, Itineraire Instructif de Rome, Roma 1794, p. 396
- E. Platner, Bes Chreibung der Stadt Rom, III.3. Das Marsfeld, die Tiberinsel, Trastevere und der Janiculus, III, Stuttgart 1842, p. 296
- A. Venturi, Il Museo e la Galleria Borghese, Roma 1893, p. 133
- B. Berenson, The North Italian Painters of the Renaissance, New York-London 1907, p. 227
- E. G. Gardner, The Painters of the School of Ferrara, London 1911, p. 237
- R. Longhi, Precisioni nelle gallerie italiane. Galleria Borghese, Roma 1928, p. 198
- B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of Renaissance. A list of the Principal Artist and their Works with an Index of Places, Oxford 1932, p. 188
- B. Berenson, Pitture italiane del Rinascimento: catalogo dei principali artisti e delle loro opere con un indice dei luoghi, Milano 1936, p. 236
- P. Della Pergola, La Galleria Borghese. I Dipinti, I, Roma 1955, n. 70
- A. Nappi, Il Garofalo, Milano 1959, p. 55
- P. Della Pergola, L’inventario Borghese del 1693. III, «Arte Antica e Moderna», 30, 1965, p. 202
- B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Central Italian and North Italian Schools, I, London 1968, p. 157
- A. M. Fioravanti Baraldi, Benvenuto Tisi da Garofalo tra Rinascimento e Manierismo. Contributo alla catalogazione delle opere dell’artista dal 1512 al 1550, 1976-1977, pp. 59, 138
- A. M. Fioravanti Baraldi, Il Garofalo. Benvenuto Tisi pittore (c. 1476-1559), Rimini 1993, p. 200, n. 132
- A. Coliva, Galleria Borghese, Roma 1994, p. 127
- K. Herrmann Fiore, in Sovrane Passioni. Le raccolte d’arte della Ducale Galleria Estense, catalogo della mostra (Modena, Galleria Estense, Palazzo dei Musei, 3 ottobre - 13 dicembre 1998) a cura di J. Bentini, Milano 1998, p. 188 scheda 24
- C. Stefani, in Galleria Borghese, a cura di P. Moreno e C. Stefani, Milano 2000, p. 256
- K. Herrmann Fiore, in Il museo senza confini. Dipinti ferraresi del Rinascimento nelle raccolte romane, a cura di J. Bentini e S. Guarino, Milano 2002, pp. 198-199, scheda 40
- K. Hermann Fiore, Roma scopre un tesoro. Dalla Pinacoteca ai depositi, un museo che non ha più segreti, Roma 2006, p. 70
- M. Danieli, scheda n. 27, in Garofalo. Pittore della Ferrara Estense, catalogo della mostra (Ferrara, Castello Estense, 5 aprile - 6 luglio 2008), a cura di T. Kustodieva, M. Lucco, Milano 2008, p. 159
