Lot 281: DANIELE CRESPI

BUSTO ARSIZIO CIRCA 1597 - 1630 MILAN ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA RECEIVING COMMUNION FROM CHRIST Pen and brown ink and wash heightened with white over black chalk, squared in red chalk; bears pencil attribution on the mount, not in Skippe's hand: Francesco Curradi 229 by 163 mm

London, 1975, no. 32 (as Enea Salmeggia, called Il Talpino)

K. Andrews, Catalogue of Italian Drawings..., Cambridge 1968, vol. I, p. 116, under no. D 1944

Jonathan Richardson, Junior (L.2170); John Skippe, by descent to Mrs Rayner Wood, Edward Holland Martin, his sale, London, Christie's, 20-21 November 1958, lor 80D (as Francesco Curradi); Edward Hutton; sale, London, Sotheby's, 9 April 1970, lot 27 (as Enea Salmeggia, called Il Talpino), purchased by Ralph Holland

The attribution to Salmeggia was first made by Philip Pouncey but Ralph Holland recorded in his notes that David McTavish suggested an alternative attribution to Daniele Crespi in a letter dated 18 December 1975. Keith Andrews noted the stylistic resemblance to a very similar study, also attributed to Salmeggia by Pouncey, in the National Gallery of Scotland: An Angel handing the martyr's palm to a nun.1 They share the same stylized features and the same technique and similar size, so must have been preparatory for the same project. It has been suggested that the nun could be identified as St. Clara. We have not been able to connect these two studies with any known surviving painted work by Daniele Crespi. 1. K. Andrews, loc. cit., and reproduced vol.II, fig. 785