Lot 244: Giovanni Pietro Rizzoli, il Giampietrino (active Milan c. 1495-1540)

Giovanni Pietro Rizzoli, il Giampietrino (active Milan c. 1495-1540)
The Madonna and Child with Saint Stephen and Saint John the Baptist
oil on panel
34 7/8 x 28¾ in. (88.5 x 73 cm.), including additions of approximately 1 5/8 in. (4 cm.) on the left and right sides

Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 24 May 1991, lot 47.

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price and at 17.5% on the buyer's premium
Giampietrino is one of the most interesting of all the Lombard followers of Leonardo da Vinci. He may have trained in Leonardo's workshop as early as the mid-1490s, and his mature style shows the clear influence of Leonardo's second Milanese period (mid-1508-13), for example a group of devotional paintings of the Madonna and Child, including Madonna of the Cherries (Milan, Rob Smeets Collection) and Madonna and Child (Rome, Galleria Borghese) of circa 1510 (see P.C. Marani, 'Giovan Pietro Rizzoli, called Giampietrino' in G. Bora, et al., The Legacy of Leonardo: Painters in Lombardy 1490-1530, Milan, 1998, pp. 275-300). The present work shares an affinity with these as well as Leonardo's drawings, one of which, Madonna and Child with a cat (British Museum, no. 1860-6-16-100), depicts the Virgin's head in a very similar position.