Madonna and Child

Pulzone Scipione

(Gaeta c. 1550 - Rome 1598)

Signed and dated ‘'SCIPIO GAJETANUS FACIEBAT 1592’, this work formed part of the impressive collection of Cardinal Girolamo Bernerio, which he donated to Scipione Borghese in 1611. Iacomo Manilli mentioned the canvas in 1650 with the proper attribution to the painter from Gaeta. The work is inspired by the classical ‘Eleusa’ Virgin, in line with Counter Reformation spirituality, which demanded sacred images with clear content and immediate impact. It depicts the Virgin who rests her cheek against that of her son Jesus, who is shown holding a tender rose, whose thorns allude to the mystery of the passion and death of Christ.

Object details

Commentary

The painting comes from the collection of Cardinal Girolamo Bernerio (‘a work of the Virgin and Our Lord, with a frame, a copy by Gaetano, five scudi’; Schütze 1999), who donated it to Scipione Borghese in 1611 together with other works. From that moment it formed part of the family’s possessions. In his 1650 description of the Borghese Collection, Iacomo Manilli rightly ascribed it to Scipione Pulzone: ‘the small painting below of the Virgin with Christ on her lap is by Scipione Gaetano’ (Manilli 1650). The same attribution was maintained in all the Borghese documents (Inv. 1693; Inv. 1790; Inventario Fidecomissario 1833) and confirmed by critics (Barbier de Montault 1870; Piancastelli 1891; Venturi 1893; Longhi 1928; Della Pergola 1959). The inscription with the artist’s signature and the date ‘1592’, which reappeared following the cleaning of the work in 1952, provided certain proof.

As a number of critics have pointed out (Zeri 1957; Vaudo 1976; De Mieri 2016), the canvas was inspired by ancient pictorial models, in line with Counter Reformation spirituality, which demanded sacred images with clear content and immediate impact. The work is a perfect example of post-Tridentine artistic culture, here summarised by the meticulous Pulzone in forms which are rigorously ‘sterilised, polished and shined’ (see Zeri 1957, Zuccari 2013 in Scipione Pulzone 2013, pp. 75-78), traits which the painter repeats in other contemporary works, such as the Holy Family in the Borghese Collection (1588-80; inv. no. 313), the Saint Praxedes in the Museo de la Colegiata di Castrojeres (1590), and the Mater Divinae Providentiae in San Carlo ai Catinari in Rome (c.1594).

The depiction of the Virgin follows the so-called Eleusa model (Greek for ‘showing mercy’). Mary’s cheek in fact touches that of her son Jesus, who holds a rose in his hand, symbol of the passion of Christ and – according to the Golden Legend by Jacobus de Voragine – of his role as mediator between man and God (Nicolaci 2013).

Adolfo Venturi (1893) called attention to a replica of the painting, held today in the Prado Museum in Madrid, while Rebeca Carretero Calvo (2012) pointed out another version, signed and dated, in the Huesca Cathedral. A refined derivation, attributed to Giovan Francesco Guerrieri (Pieri collection, Cesena) was published in 2009 by Massimo Pulini, who suggested that it was executed during that painter’s stay in Rome when he worked for the Borghese and had the opportunity of studying Pulzone’s canvas.

Antonio Iommelli