Lot 29: Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio (Siena 1410-1449)

Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio (Siena 1410-1449)
The Madonna and Child with Saints John the Baptist, Lucy, Catherine of Alexandria and Paul, and two angels, with The Crucifixion above
on gold ground panel, shaped top, in an integral frame
23¾ x 11 1/8 in. (60.3 x 28.3 cm.)
the reverse painted with trompe-l'oeil architectural detailing

C. Brandi, Quattrocentisti senesi, Milan, 1949, note 104, as 'Ambrosi' (i.e. Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio).
M. Gregori, 'Un'opera giovanile di Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrosio', Paragone, VII, no. 75, March 1956, pp. 48-9, pl. 31, as an early work by Pietro di Giovanni.
C. Volpi, 'Ancora su Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio', Paragone, XIV, no. 165, September 1963, p. 39.
B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Central Italian and North Italian Schools, London, 1968, I, p. 5 and II, pl. 562.
M. Boskovits, in Dizionario enciclopedico Bolaffi dei pittori e degli incisori italiani, IX, Turin, 1975, p. 64.
Die Sammlung Hubertus und Renate Wald, Hamburg, Hamburg, 1998, p. 150.
M.G. Fattorini, in Da Jacopo della Quercia a Donatello: Le arti a Siena nel primo Rinascimento, exhibition catalogue, Siena, Santa Maria della Scala, 2010, p. 248, under no. C.26.

Sterbini, Rome.
with Bottenweiser, Berlin, 1929, as 'Sassetta'.
with Van Diemen, Berlin, 1930, as 'Sassetta'.
with Jacques Goudstikker, Amsterdam, on consignment prior to July 1940, as 'Sassetta'.
with the art trade, Paris, before 1949, as 'Sassetta'.
with Galerie Gebhardt Alte Kunst, Munich, by May 1966.

HUBERTUS WALD
Enterpreneur, Donor and Collector of Art


Hubertus Wald was 33 years of age when, just after the Second World War, he became an entrepreneur and built one of the first new movie theatres in Germany. His main assets: a positive entrepreneurial outlook and a permit from the press officer of the British occupation forces. People were hungry for US-movies and were willing to pay the usual entrance fee in Reichsmarks of uncertain value, along with a log of fire wood or a 'Brikett', a cube of pressed soft coal, per person to fuel the cinema's furnace.

Step by step, Hubertus Wald formed what became the largest German cinema group of its time. He sold it when he foresaw that television would come to replace movie theatres and instead invested in real estate in Germany, the USA and Canada. When he passed away in 2005, aged 92, not only did he make his wife Renate, whom he had married 30 years earlier, his heir, but also the Hubertus Wald Stiftung, which he had founded in 1993. This charitable organisation finances medical research and treatment in Hamburg's hospitals and is a big donor to Hamburg's cultural institutions, such as its acclaimed museums and orchestra, the Hamburger Symphoniker.

To sum up his life: he earned millions and he gave away millions. He was a man of style, extremely generous, as well as a very caring host who did all he could to see his many guests happy. His dinner parties on the fashionable island of Sylt were famous. And he was a discerning collector of art. Around 1995, the Hubertus and Renate Wald collection was almost complete. He and his wife had purchased paintings, antiquities and antiques, amassing a collection that was breathtaking both in its depth and its scope, as well as its quality.

The proceeds from the auction will be used to enlarge the assets of his Foundation. This means that more funds will serve its exclusively charitable purposes: treatment in Hamburg's hospitals and the continued enrichment of Hamburg's cultural life.


Dr. Günter Hess
Chairman of The Hubertus Wald Foundation
Hamburg, October 2011



PROPERTY FROM THE HUBERTUS WALD CHARITABLE FOUNDATION

Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio (Siena 1410-1449)
The Madonna and Child with Saints John the Baptist, Lucy, Catherine of Alexandria and Paul, and two angels, with The Crucifixion above
on gold ground panel, shaped top, in an integral frame
23¾ x 11 1/8 in. (60.3 x 28.3 cm.)
the reverse painted with trompe-l'oeil architectural detailing