Description:

red chalk, pen and brown ink, brown wash
327 x 204 mm

Provenance:

Probably Queen Christina of Sweden (1626-1689), Rome
by bequest to Cardinal Decio Azzolini (1623-1689), Rome
by descent to his nephew, Marchese Pompeo Azzolino (d. 1696), Rome
Prince Livio Odescalchi (1652-1713), Rome, 1692
by descent to the Odescalchi family
by descent to Prince Ladislao Odescalchi (1920-2000), Rome
Christie’s, London: 30 March 1976, Lot 52
Duke Roberto Ferretti di Castelferretto (1923-2005)
his sale, Christie’s, London: 2 July 1996, Lot 80
with Day & Faber, London
where acquired by the present owner in July 1996

Literature

M. Mahoney, Salvator Rosa, exh. cat., Hayward Gallery, London, 1973, mentioned under no. 77  
M. Mahoney, The Drawings of Salvator Rosa, New York and London, 1977, no. 76.10 (recto) and no. 76.5 (verso), illustrated

Note:

This drawing is a study for the right-hand section of Salvator Rosa’s The Philosopher’s Wood, now in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence. The painting, which is a light-hearted tribute to Raphael’s School of Athens and reflects the influence of Claude and the Venetian painters of the 16th century, has been dated by Michael Mahoney to the mid 1640s, when Rosa was working in Florence. The painting follows the drawing in most major details, save for the addition of the kneeling figure of the boy in the foreground. The boy is the turning point of Rosa’s philosophical narrative, which relates an episode from the life of Diogenes, the ancient Greek Cynic philosopher who sought to be free of earthly attachments. Upon seeing the boy using his hands to drink from a stream, Diogenes threw away his bowl, his last remaining possession. The composition and its companion piece, The Harbour Scene with Crates, another meditation on the necessity of earthly goods, preserve the atmosphere of debate in Rosa’s circle on whether the intellectual could live with integrity at the court, or should, like the early Cynics or Stoics, cultivate wisdom in seclusion.

A second study for the painting, which shares the same provenance as the present drawing and likely originates from the collection of Queen Christina of Sweden, is now in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm.

SOLD