Lot 196: GIROLAMO BRUSAFERRO

GIROLAMO BRUSAFERRO VENICE 1700 - 1760 SAMSON FREEING HIMSELF oil on canvas 92.5 by 78.8 cm.; 36 1/2 by 31 in.

Sebastian Resch (b. after 1889);
Acquired from the above by Otto Mühlbauer, Munich, in 1930;
By whom sold to the father of the present owner in 1952.

The design relates to another work of the same subject by Brusaferro in a Venetian private collection.υ1 Of landscape format, it shows Samson in a very similar pose, although his left arm is further outstretched and his entire right arm is included, reaching upwards. Delilah is placed to the right of the composition.

We are grateful to Prof. Lino Moretti for endorsing the attribution to Brusaferro in the basis of photographs.

An alternative attribution to Antonio Pellegrini has been proposed by Davide Banzato, of the Museo Civico in Padua and co-curator of the 1998-99 exhibition there dedicated to Pellegrini.

1. See A. Craievich, Alberto Molinari, Soncino 2005, reproduced p. 271, fig. 112.