(Antwerp 1540–1619 Bologna)
Noli me tangere,
oil on canvas, 118,5 x 87,5 cm, framed

We are grateful to Daniele Benati for confirming the attribution after inspecting the painting in the original.

The present painting is a work by Denis Calvaert, a Flemish artist who settled in Italy and worked in Bologna. It presumably belongs to the artist’s first Bolognese period, when he studied with Lorenzo Sabatini. The autograph nature of the present painting is supported by a comparison with the painting Noli me tangere at the church of Santa Maria Maddalena in Cazzano near Budrio, a work that can be attributed to this painter with certitude, signed and dated 1585. The composition is identical to the one in the present painting, though inverted laterally. Christ’s features, the drape of his garment, as well as his gesture of refusal and the detail of the shovel are all very similar. In both scenes, Calvaert chose a background that lends depth to the landscape (cf. T. Montella, Dionisio Calvart (Anversa 1540?-Bologna 1619), in: La pittura bolognese del ‘500, vol. II, ed. V. Fortunati, Bologna 1986, p 683–685, 696). Dating the painting to the early period is also supported by the stylistic resonance with some works by Lorenzo Sabatini, such as the Virgin in the painting Virgin and Child with this Infant St John at the Louvre, Paris (Inv.-No. 596).