Lot 129: Niccolò Berrettoni (Macerata di Montefeltro 1637-1682 Rome)

Niccolò Berrettoni (Macerata di Montefeltro 1637-1682 Rome)
Head of a young boy with curly hair, looking down to the right
red and white chalk, on faded blue paper, watermark crowned encircled fleur-de-lys
11¼ x 8½ in. (28.4 x 21.7 cm.)
In a Louis XIII carved and gilded frame

London, Thos. Agnew and Sons Ltd., Old Master Drawings from Holkham, 1977, no. 99.

A.E. Popham and C.E. Lloyd, Old Master Drawings at Holkham Hall, Chicago, 1986, no. 59.

Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester (1697-1759), Holkham Hall, his mount with the attribution 'Nic: Berretoni' in the hand formerly identified as William Kent's; and by descent.
The Trustees of the Holkham Settled Estates; Christie's, London, 2 July 1991, lot 56.
The frame: Anonymous Sale, Christie's, London, 11 July 1991, lot 108.

Berrettoni began his artistic training with Simone Cantarini in Pesaro and moved to Rome in 1670, where he joined the workshop of Carlo Maratta. Among his most important commissions as an independent master were his works in the Cappella di Sant' Anna in the church of Santa Maria in Montesanto and the Sala Rossa in Palazzo Altieri, on which he was working in the year he died. He was admitted as a member of the Accademia di San Luca in 1675.

The drawing is stylistically comparable with a drawing by Berrettoni, of Two cherubs holding a scroll, in the Courtauld Institute (Sir Robert Witt Bequest; inv. D.1952.RW.3241). Further comparisons can be found in Berrettoni's painted oeuvre, such as the putti who are frescoed in the pendentives at Santa Maria in Montesanto in Rome (F. Titi, Studio di Pittura, Scoltura, et Architettura, nelle Chiese di Roma, Florence, 1987, II, p. 370, figs. 1386-9). A child with a very similar facial type and the same wiry curls is represented on the left-hand side of Berrettoni's Marriage of the Virgin in the Convento degli Scolopi in Frascati (G. Sestieri, Repertorio della Pittura Romana della fine del Seicento e del Settecento, Turin, 1994, II, fig. 100).