Lot 25: Attributed to Pietro Paolo Bonzi, called Gobbo dei Frutti or Gobbo dei Carracci , Cortona circa 1576 - 1636 Rome Laughing Young Man with a Melon and Snail oil on canvas, unframed

oil on canvas, unframed

measurements note 28.5 by 23.5 in.; 72.4 by 59.7 cm.

W.R. Valentiner, "Baroque Paintings", in Bulletin of the Art Division, Los Angeles County Museum, Spring 1947, pp. 10-11, reproduced fig. 3 (as Michael Sweerts);
W. Stechow, "Some Portraits by Michael Sweerts," in Art Quarterly, Detroit Institute of Arts, XIV, 1951, p. 215, no. 38;
E. Battisti, "Profilo del Gobbo dei Caracci," in Commentari 5 (1954), p. 302;
R. Kultzen, Michael Sweerts, dissertation, Hamburg 1954, no. 151;
P. Wescher and E. Feinblatt, Los Angeles County Museum, Catalogue of Paintings I: Catalogue of Italian French and Spanish Paintings, XV-XVIII Century, Los Angeles 1954, p. 40, cat. no. 36, reproduced;
C. Sterling, Still Life Painting from Antiquity to the Present Time, New York 1959, p. 141, no. 119;
B. Fredericksen and F. Zeri, Census of Pre-Nineteenth-Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1972, p. 591;
S. Schaefer, et al., European Painting and Sculpture in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles 1987, p. 22, reproduced;
R. Kultzen, Michael Sweerts, Doornspijk 1996, p. 138, cat. no. R20, reproduced plate 176 (listed under "Rejected Attributions");
E.M. Zafran, "Michael Sweerts in America: Collecting, Commerce and Scholarship," in Michael Sweerts (1618-164), exhibition catalogue, Amsterdam, Hartford, and San Francisco 2002, pp. 59-60, reproduced fig. 55.

With Anthony Reyre, London and New York, by whom sold in 1946 to Hearst;
William Randolph Hearst, by whom given to,
The Hearst Foundation, New York and California;
Gift of the Hearst Foundation to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 1946, (acc. no. 46.16.19).

SOLD BY THE LOS ANGELES COUNTY MUSEUM OF ART TO BENEFIT FUTURE ACQUISITIONS
Once ascribed to Michael Sweerts, this painting was subsequently attributed to Bonzi based on its close affinity with Bonzi's Boy with Melon once in the Giustiniani collection and later in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin (where it was destroyed).υ1 While the subject of this intriguing painting remains unknown, it may illustrate a proverb or saying. The snail, due to its slowness, is traditionally the symbol of laziness and sloth. However the snail is sometimes seen as a fertility symbol with its shell representing a womb and its horns and slimy body symbolizing both male and female reproductive organs. Given the young man's light-hearted demeanor and sly glance, it would seem more likely to be an allusion to something of a sexual nature. 1. See F. Zeri, La natura morta in Italia, Milan 1989, vol. II, p. 698, reproduced fig. 825.