(Sermoneta 1521–1575 Rome)
Portrait of a Cardinal, circa 1560-65,
oil on canvas, 111.5 x 86 cm, framed

Provenance:
sale, Galleria Geri, Rome, 13th February 1926, lot 486 (as Sebastiano del Piombo);
Private European collection

We are grateful to Francesco Petrucci for suggesting the attribution on the basis of a high resolution digital photograph and for his help in cataloguing the present painiting.

The present portrait, which is of notable quality and rarity for the genre, belongs to the tradition of counter-reformation portraiture in Rome. Stylistically, it is close to the tradition of Raphael however the influence of a Michelangiolesque Venetian source is also apparent which can be traced back to the influence of Sebastiano del Piombo.

The physical description of the sitter’s features tends to a formalising abstraction and a certain rigidity of pose that are typical of the most advanced phase of Roman mannerism, around the years 1560-65, which has been styled as ‘counter-mannerism’, on account of its appeal to diverse influences.

The present portrait stands out as a measured and conservative counterpoint to the visionary and expressionist portraiture of Jacopino del Conte (Florence 1615 - Rome 1598), which later converged with the ‘timeless art’ (F. Zeri) of his pupil Scipione Pulzone (Gaeta 1640/42 - Rome 1598), the finest Roman portraitist of the last quarter of the century.

The most likely artist to produce a portrait such as this is Girolamo Siciolante, called Siciolante da Sermoneta, an excellent portraitist and a follower of Perin del Vaga and Leonardo da Pistoia, both pupils of Raphael. Indeed, he was capable of achieving a fusion of the latter’s style with an ‘elegant Michelangiolesque quality that…does not derive directly from the master, but rather from the influence exerted by the many Roman admirers of Michelangelo’ (see: J. Hunter, Girolamo Siciolante, pittore da Sermoneta (1521-1557), Rome 1996).

Moreover, according to recent theory, the artist may have contributed directly to the training of Pulzone, who may have frequented his studio (see: A. Vannugli, Scipione Pulzone ritrattista. Traccia per un catalogo ragionato, in Scipione Pulzone. Da Gaeta a Roma alle Corti europee, exhibition catalogue, A. Acconci, A. Zuccari (eds.), Gaeta, 27th June – 27th October 2013, Rome 2013, p. 28).

The present work’s pose and abstract connotation provide a persuasive basis for comparison with other works by the artist such as the signed and dated Portrait of Francesco II Colonna of 1561, in the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica di Palazzo Barberini, and the portraits of Cardinals Guido Ascanio and Alessandro Sforza in the Capella Sforza at Santa Maria Maggiore, as well as the Portrait of Julius III in the Galleria Spada and the Portrait of Cardinal Innocenzo Cibo in the Stadt Museum, Wiesbaden.

Especially convincing, indeed decisive, are the present work’s stylistic similarities to the Portrait of a Cardinal in Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica di Palazzo Barberini, attributed to Siciolante in 1932 by Adolfo Venturi, and identified as representing Guido Ascanio Sforza by Andrea Donati, and the Portrait of an unidentified Cardinal in the Galleria Spada (for all these portraits see: J. Hunter, op. cit., pp. 142-143, 178-181, 235-236, 245-247, 255-256; A. Donati, Ritratto e Figura nel manierismo a Roma, Villa Verrucchio (Rimini) 2010, pp. 152-154, fig. 226, 228-230, 236).