AST autumn a unique collection of Early Italian Works of art was given by Mrs. L. Farreneheit. Holden, of Ohio, to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. After always be ing demonstrated for some time as a special ex lover hibit the collection has been distributed, the several artwork being put accord ing to their colleges and epochs in the different galleries.
Of the collection Mr. Bryson-Bur esquisse, in the Bulletins of the Metropolitan Museum, has said:
Mrs. Holdens is an important col lection. In it are many pictures which, owing to the uncertainty of their-author send and schools and the ancient points that they can exemplify, appeal strongly for the prevailing flavor for que incluye noisseurship. You will discover paintings, likewise, of great rarity and natural beauty and some which would hold their own in any com pany. The collection has been com mented after in the Sfilata dArte, by simply IMary Logan Berenson, to whom most of the fixed attributions happen to be due. It can be exhaustively considered by vari ous professionnals in a forthcoming volume of Significant Paintings in American Private Collections, modified by Aug F. Jaccaci.
Most of the images are from the Italian Educational institutions and were bought from Wayne Jackson Jarves who, during many years put in in Italy, gathered many works of art which usually hie hoped might be employed as a nucleus for a north american Museum for the study of Italian Art. This individual collected his pictures with this end in view. Though the names with which he labeled them were those of the truly amazing est, he made no sham that the functions themselves had been masterpieces.
This is certainly made clear in the introduction to the handbook to get the part of his collection which was purchased simply by Mr. Holden, in which he says: The old masters of this gallery were guaranteed many years in the past when situations for their acquisition were better than currently. They are not presented because masterpieces, but as types of the greater males and their universities, fairly characterizing their motives, coloring, design, and building, average rep examples of their particular minor job, but possessing some distinc tive identifiable qualities to prospects who have built a study of them.
As one thinks Mr. Jarves achieve ment as proved by these kinds of pictures as well as the paintings of these part of his collec tion acquired by Yale School, even though we were holding secured when circum stances for their acquisition were more favorable than at the moment and though alarge majority of his attributions have been completely unable to stand the test to which the more specialised knowledge of to day features subjected them, these words and phrases seem unduly modest. In his day, ap preciation intended for such works was exceptional, par ticularly in America. Mr. Thomas J. Bryan, who gave his admirable collec tion to the New York Traditional So ciety in 1867, was the just other Méchant ican during the time whose interest in primi tive paintings travelled so far as to induce him to purchase them, even though the price was far from high.
Mr. Jarves concept that a Museum be shaped which might acquire his collec tion as a basis, unfortunately miscar ried. On his return to America he ex girlfriend or boyfriend hibited his pictures in 1860 on the Derby Photo gallery, (325 Broadway, New York, and again in 1863 on the New York Historic Society bedrooms, hoping to curiosity influential persons in his prepare, but the time was unfavorable, the in terest and energies of the general public being interested far in any other case. In 1863 he vainly offered one hundred and. 32 of his pictures for the New York Historical Society intended for $50, 500. He located no one to second his design, which after the City War his success. was no better. Having been forced to deposit the greater number of his pictures with the trustees of Yale College as a give your word for a loan which the College manufactured him.
Within meet his obligations, the photographs became the exact property of the College or university. Among the photographs offered to the Historical Society in 1863 the only one that can be definitely linked with those at this point owned by simply Mrs. Holden was the Vergine and Child attributed to Leonardo. The Boston Exhibition in 1883-1884 was performed up of functions which for reasons uknown were not transferred at Yale and others which usually it may be pre sumed were acquired later on. This was the gathering bought by simply Mr. Holden in 1884.
Of the Pop-queen and Kid ascribed to Leonardo ag Vinci which is repro duced herewith, Mr. Burroughs says, Mr. Jarves in his catalog prints five pages of letters and endorsements via critics and artists of the middle of the previous century, most unhesitatingly for this attribution. Those cited are Cav. Prof. Miglirini, Director from the Uffizi, Souverain Gariod, of the Turin Art gallery, Monsieur Rio de janeiro, the copy writer on art and creator of a Your life of Leonardo, W. Meters. Rossetti, Holman Hunt and Baron Liphart.
None of the professionals of to-day consider this amazing little photo to be by the hand of Leonardo. It is ascribed fairly generally to Ambrogio da Predis, Mrs. Berenson detects that it has some analogy with that artists backup of The Virgin mobile of the Rocks in the Em tional Photo gallery. I will endeavor to suggest another name-that of Francesco Napolitano while the probable author, basing my surmise, however , just on will not be of his work and descriptions of his color.
The Madonna and Child in the New york city Historical Therefore ciety, a vastly substandard work, is a only picture ascribed to him which I have seen just lately. Relying on photographs, however , My spouse and i find a impressive similarity of fashion and type between his acknowl edged pictures which. In the Mtadonna and Kid recently acquired by the Zurich Museum, away of a private collection in Geneva, the landscape is definitely practically the counterpart of the view throughout the opening with the right in Mrs. Holdens picture.
The Zurich painting is agreed upon with a punning sig characteristics accepted as undoubtedly Napo litanos. It includes the same likeness to Ambrogio da Predis as gets the picture under consideration. To the AMadonna and Child En throned, with New orleans saints Paul and Anthony with the left, Augustine and Sebastian at the right, gold qualifications, by Lorenzo da San Severino, and this is illus trated, he pertains as follows: In cases like this the authorities are incredibly unani mous, not only in relation to the authorship of the picture, but its quality as well, as well as no one may fail to feel the appeal of their sweet dry color, the tran quillity of their expression, as well as the dig nity of loveliness of the personages. One of these is particularly alluring-the exquisite young gentleman using a green sprig in the lilac cap saucily set on his golden curl, who positions as St Sebastian.
