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The chapel of the courtesan and the quarrel of the Magdalens
Art Bulletin, The, June, 2002 by Christopher L.C.E. Witcombe
According to Vasari, one of Penni's assistants was Lionardo, called "il Pistoia." But as Lionardo was otherwise a pupil and assistant of Raphael's, it seems unlikely that his relationship to Penni was quite as Vasari describes it. (97) Vasari also records that Giulio Romano's principal assistants after Raphael's death were Giovanni da Lione and Raffaellino del Colle. (98) Virtually nothing is known about the former, (99) but the latter emerges as an identifiable artistic personality after he returned to his native Borgo Sansepolcro following Giulio Romano's departure for Mantua in 1524. (100) Although Giulio certainly collaborated with Penni on particular commissions, such as the Assumption and Coronation of the Virgin for the convent of Monteluce in Perugia, (101) at other times he evidently gave his designs over to his pupils, of whom Raffaellino del Colle was the most accomplished. (102)
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Although Vasari makes no mention of Raffaellino assisting Giulio in the Magdalen Chapel, he should be considered a likely participant. In particular, Raffaellino can be linked to the altarpiece, which Johannes Wilde had in fact ascribed entirely to him. (103) The figure of Christ, for example, can be seen in a drawing of the Resurrection in the Louvre (Fig. 11), which at one time was attributed to Giulio Romano but is now given to Raffaellino. (104) The complete drawing evidently also formed the basis for Raffaellino's own painting of the Resurrection executed soon after he left Rome and returned to Borgo Sansepolcro in 1524-25 (Fig. 12). (105) The figure of Christ in the painting, however, appears to be drawn from that in the Magdalen Chapel Noli me tangere (Fig. 1) rather than from the drawing.
The designer of the altarpiece seems to have based the figure of Mary Magdalen on the one of Saint Catherine that appears in the lower right of Giulio Romano's painting Christ in Glory with Four Saints (the so-called Deesis panel) in the Galleria Nazionale in Parma. (106) A badly damaged modello for the painting in the Louvre is attributed to either Giulio' Romano or Penni. (107) The modello, rather than the painting, with the addition of a tree at the right, was engraved by Marcantonio (Fig. 13). (108)
Although this accumulating circumstantial evidence, coupled with stylistic affinities found in his autograph work of a few years later, argues in favor of the possibility that Raffaellino may have had a hand in painting the altarpiece for the Magdalen Chapel, there is little stylistic evidence to indicate that he was also involved in painting the surviving lunette (or, it might be inferred, any of the other lunettes). One last point is worth mentioning. As the painted decorations must have been under way if not completed before Giulio departed for Mantua in 1524, it is possible, given the usual delays in such undertakings, that the actual project dates to before 1520 and that the commission originally had been given to Raphael. (109)
Notes
An earlier version of this study was read as a paper at the Southeastern College Art Conference (SECAC) in Memphis, Tennessee, 1991. The sections devoted to Mary Magdalen are drawn from papers presented at the Sixteenth Century Studies Conference in St. Louis in 1993 and at the conference "Mary Magdalen in History and Legend" at the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at the University of California at Los Angeles in 1997. Research and travel in the United States and Europe and the purchase of photographs were made possible with grants from Sweet Briar College. I want to thank Perry Chapman, for her astute editorial comments, and the two readers, Alexander Nagel and Sheryl Weiss, for their helpful observations and suggestions. My thanks also to Lynn Laufenberg and Arne Flaten for reading the penultimate draft of this paper, and to Lory Frankel for her help in producing the final draft.
