Description
tempera and gold on marouflaged panel This small panel originally formed part of a series of panels, possibly intended as a predella, illustrating episodes from the life of Saint Catherine: others from the same series include Saint Catherine invested with the Dominican Habit (Cleveland Museum of Art); The Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine (private collection, New York); Saint Catherine with a Beggar (Cleveland Museum of Art); Saint Catherine Exchanging her heart with Christ (private collection, New York); Saint Catherine Receiving the Stigmata; Saint Catherine beseeching Christ to resuscitate her Mother (both in the Robert Lehman collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York); The Miraculous Communion of Saint Catherine (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York); Saint Catherine Dictating her dialogues to Raymond of Capua (Detroit Institute of Art); Saint Catherine before a Pope (Thyssen-Bornemisza Foundation, Madrid); and The Crucifixion (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) (see C. Strehlke, see Literature below, pp. 224-240, cat. nos. 38 a-k). Two further panels from the altarpiece, showing The Blessed Andrea Gallerani and The Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni are in the Robert Lehman collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Strehlke, op. cit., pp. 241-2, cat. nos. 38 l-m). The main panel, showing The Purification of the Virgin, is today in the Pinacoteca in Siena. The so-called `Saint Catherine of Siena Series' has been discussed in exhaustive detail by Carl Strehlke (see Literature below, pp. 218-242), and only some of the points raised by him are discussed here below. The altarpiece was apparently commissioned by the guild of the Pizzicaiuoli (purveyors of dry goods) for their new chapel in the Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala in 1447, the contract stating that the altarpiece was to be completed in time for All Saints' Day (November 1st) in 1449. The contract (cited by Strehlke, op. cit., p. 218) does not specify the subject but it does make clear that the altarpiece was to contain "figuris et storiis" (i.e. full-length figures as well as narrative scenes; the latter presumably referring to a predella series). There are three main schools of thought regarding the painting's reconstruction, which remains entirely conjectural: the first is that the narrative series was intended from inception to serve as a predella to The Purification of the Virgin since the moment of its inception (a fact supported by the reading of the contract mentioned above); the second is that the series was added as a sort of predella only after Catherine's canonization in 1461 (a theory possibly supported by the fact that she is shown with a saint's halo rather than rays, as she had traditionally been depicted before in Sienese painting); and the third rejects any association of the smaller scenes with The Purification of the Virgin panel and suggests instead that these scenes originally surrounded an image of Saint Catherine. Although the `Saint Catherine Series', to which this panel belongs, could have formed a predella to the Pizzicaiuoli altarpiece, it is not possible to suggest an entirely convincing reconstruction without putting into question the chronology of the scenes or their technical evidence (for example, the direction of the woodgrain). For an extremely detailed discussion of the possible arrangement of the panels, see Strehlke, ibid., pp. 219-222. The location of this particular scene within the whole scheme has been tentatively put forward as a position beneath the front face of the right pilaster (idem, p. 220). The painting's provenance is reconstructed in great detail by Strehlke (ibid, p. 218 ff.) who notes that the rectors of the guild were apparently dissatisfied with the altarpiece and although they asked for it to be replaced by a Saint Michael the Archangel (to whom the chapel was dedicated in 1457), the main panel of the St. Catherine altarpiece was retained in situ until at least 1575, when it was described by Bossio. Some time in the mid-17th century, possibly as early as 1639, the altarpiece was moved from the church to the altar of Santa Cristina in the (no longer used) cemetery and in the 18th century the painting is described in great analytical detial by Abate Carli (see Literature below). By circa 1775, the date of Carli's manuscript, the painting had suffered somewhat and had already been dismembered into smaller fragments: the small paintings (presumably the predella scenes) were placed in the rectors' rooms. At that date the painting had already been restored (rinfrescato) and Carli describes how the gilding had already begun to wear off ("The background is gilt, but only in a few places"). On this particular panel, a strip approximately 3 inches wide, at the extreme right of the composition, is a modern addition, supposedly filling in for a section of the panel which was presumably lost or damaged when the predella panels were separated and dispersed in the second half of the 18th century. The monk standing at the right, with raised hands, is a literal quotation from Giotto's Death of Saint Francis and the Verification of the Stigmata in the Bardi Chapel, church of Santa Croce, Florence, and may be a modern restorer's invention, though it may equally reflect Giovanni di Paolo's original composition. This painting was acquired in Siena by Johann Anton Ramboux, together with other (though not all) panels from the dismembered altarpiece, probably in 1838; the year in which Ramboux wrote to Johann David Passavant, telling him that he had acquired numerous paintings in Siena which he was sending back to Germany (another painting acquired on that particular occasion was the Girolamo di Benvenuto Presentation of the Virgin panel, also from a predella, sold, Sotheby's, London, July 9, 1998, lot 60). Johann Anton Ramboux was an important figure in the history of collecting. He was an early connoisseur of Italian primitives, which he collected prolifically in Siena and Florence, principally between 1838 and 1842. Many of his letters to the authorities in Florence, and the export documents for his purchases from the Grand-Duchy of Tuscany are preserved. These, and Ramboux's activities in Tuscany are amply discussed by Christopher Merzenich, "Di dilettanza per un' artista - Der Sammler Antonio Giovanni Ramboux in der Toskana, in Lust und Verlust. Kölner Sammler zwischen Trikolore und Preussenadler, exhibition catalogue, Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, October 26, 1995-January 28, 1996, pp. 303-321. The painting was also owned by the Belgian engineer and banker, Adolphe Stoclet (1871-1949), one of the greatest collectors of Italian primitives in the 20th century. He began collecting Italian art whilst working on an engineering project in Milan (for the North Milan Tram Service), between 1896 to 1902, after which he and his wife, Suzanne Stevens, moved to Vienna to work in a bank for two years, and then to Brussels (after he had inherited his father's fortune in 1904). He probably acquired this painting after his return to Belgium and almost certainly after the completion of his villa, the Palais Stoclet, in which much of his collection is still housed. Saint Catherine of Siena died at the age of thirty-three in Rome, on April 29, 1380. Although she was apparently prepared for her death, having received indulgences from both Pope Gregory XI and Pope Urban VI, sources relate that at the time of her death only a few members of her close family and followers were present. Giovanni di Paolo has been loyal to the sources in this respect: only nine people are shown at her bedside, all dressed in Dominican habits, and they are shown with varying expressions of grief. One monk kneels to kiss the corpse's crossed hands; another clutches his habit to his face to wipe the tears; and another buries his face in his habit with grief. This and other predella panels in the `Saint Catherine of Siena Series' are fine examples of the type of painting in which Giovanni di Paolo excelled. His powers of invention in storytelling were perfectly suited to narrative cycles and this not only engaged his own imagination but also those of his patrons. Although there was almost no tradition of narrative painting in Siena prior to the Quattrocento, Giovanni di Paolo - like many Sienese painters of his generation (including Sano di Pietro) - applied his skills not just to panel-painting but also to manuscript illumination (see, for example, those exhibited in Painting in Renaissance Siena 1420-1500, New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1988, pp. 178-189).
Provenance
Commissioned from the artist as part of an altarpiece for the Church of the Spedale of Santa Maria della Scala, Siena, in 1447 acquired by Johann Anton Ramboux, Cologne, probably in 1838 in Siena (Sale: Heberle/Lempertz, Cologne, May 23, 1867, lot 113) Fürstlich Hohenzollern'schen Museum, Sigmaringen, circa 1871 Adolphe Stoclet (1871-1949) collection, Brussels, by 1922 (and probably after 1904) John Russell Vanderlip, Minneapolis, circa 1930 by whom bequeathed to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 1935 by whom de-accessioned in 1958 with E.V. Thaw & Co., Inc., New York from whom acquired by the present collector in 1985 Exhibited: New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Painting in Renaissance Siena, 1420-1500, December 20, 1988-1989, no. 38j Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Prized Possessions: European Paintings from Private Collections of Friends of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, June 17-August 16, 1992, no. 59.
