The Giambono’s Provenance
(Picture: Villa I Tatti/flickr.com)
A picture that Bernard Berenson bought from Jean Paul Richter – the St. Michael Archangel Enthroned by Michele Giambono. Luisa Vertova recalls:
»One day I praised to Berenson the subdued richness of its colors: the reds merging into the brown and gold, the yellowish green of the angels’ robes brought into relief by the bottle-green ground. Unlike the average collector, Berenson was critical of his possessions and praise elicited his severity. ›The colour, yes, is good. But don’t you see how hopeless the drawing is? It looks like a paper doll with a paper dress on that is too big for it. All the same‹, he added, ›those arabesques on the dress, and the dragon’s tail, are gorgeous.‹« (source: Great Private Collections, ed. by Douglas Cooper (1963), wherein Luisa Vertova speaks about the Berenson collection)
A picture with Luisa Vertova, at right, and Bernard Berenson (source: oralhistory.itatti.harvard.edu)
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