Francesco Salviati's ceiling painting for Palazzo Grimani rediscovered

Apollo, Jan, 2004 by Andrea G. De Marchi

The reappearance of this crucial work allows us to review the progress of Salviati's career, which remains controversial in various respects, not least in relation to his activities as a portraitist, for which he was much admired in his day. Thus far, all attempts to establish a corpus of his portraits have failed to convince, because they invariably seem to include a number of works which are manifestly by different hands. Given the current uncertainty, I would like to make what is necessarily a very tentative suggestion to the effect that he may have been responsible for the Portrait of an architect in the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, once believed to be a likeness of Sansovino by Titian, and furthermore that the sitter may be Antonio da Sangallo the Younger. (30)

(1) For this translation, see G. Vasari, Lives of the Painters, Sculptors and Architects, translated by Gaston de Vere with an Introduction and Notes by David Ekserdjian, 2 vols., London, 1996, vol. II, p. 364. For the original, see idem, Le Vite..., 1568 edition, P. Della Pergola, L. Grassi, G. Previtali (eds.), Novara, 1967, vol. VI p, 522, 'E giunto in Vinezia, fu raccolto cortesemente dal patriarca Grimani [Giovanni] e da Messer Vettor suo fratello, che gli focero infinite carezze. Al quale Patriarca, dope pochi giorni, fece a olio in uno ottangolo di quattro braccia una bellissima Psiche alla quale, come a dea, per le sue bellezze, sono offerti incensi e voti; il quaie ottangalo fu posto in un salotto della casa di quel signore, dove e un palco nel cui mezzo girano alcuni festoni fatti da Camille Mantovano, pittore in fare paesi, fiori, frondi, frutti et altre si fatte cose eccell[enti]; fu posto il detto ottangolo in mezzo di quattro quadri di braccia due e mezzo l'uno, fatti di storie della medesima Psiche, come si disse nella vita del Genga, da Francesco da Furli. Il quale ottangolo e non solo il piu bello senza comparazione di detti quattro quadri, ma la piu bella opera di pittura the sia in tutta Vinezia.' For the four framing scenes by Francesco Menzocchi 'in un salotto ... del patriarca', see ibid., vol. VI, p. 220. I.H. Cheney, 'Francesco Salviati's North Italian Journey', Art Bulletin, 1963, vol. XLV, no. 4, p. 338, argues that Salviati began work on the coiling in 1540, after completing the Portrait of Aretino which was sent to Francois I.

(2) Federico Zuccari had already noted in his marginalia to his copy of Vasari: 'Questo quadro del Salviati e molto bello e delle bone cose che lui facesse; non pero la piu bella opera di Venezia. E a dir questo, Giorgio mostra di non intendersene" ('this painting by Salviati is very beautiful, and one of his best; however, it is not the most beautiful work in Venice, and in claiming it is, Giorgio reveals his lack of understanding').

(3) See L. Lanzi, Storia Pittorica della Italia ..., 1794 edition, Basano, 1809, vol. L, pp. 201-202.

(4) The sheet is inscribed: 'Di Francesco Salviati', perhaps in Baldinucci's hand; see J. Byam Shaw, Drawings by Old Masters at Christ Church Oxford, 2 vols., Oxford, 1976, no. 150, who notes Michael Hirst and John Gere's support for the Salviati attribution, Philip Pouncey's attribution to Vasari, and Konrad Oberhuber's surprising demotion of it to copy status. W.R. Rearick, 'Francesco Salviati and Giuseppe Porta and Venetian Draftsmen', in C. Monbeig Goguel, P. Costamagna and M. Hochmann, Francesco Salviati et la Bella Maniera: Actes des colloques de Rome et de Paris (1998), Rome, 2001, pp. 455 78, especially p. 461, fig. 1, connected a drawing by Salviati in the Narodni Galerie, Prague (no. 24.554), which is signed and dated 1540, with the project; however, it only seems to bear a genetic similarity with the head of Psyche in the canvas.