Lot 123A: Francesco Gallimberti

Francesco Gallimberti
Major General Aleksandr Vassil'evich Suvorov (1729-1800), in uniform, surmounted by allegorical figures of Victory,one holding a laurel crown, the other a trumpet, a female figure at Suvorov's feet presenting a key on a silver dish
incised 'F. Gallimberti M [?]772' watercolour, gouache and heightened in white, on ivory
rectangular, 7 1/8 x 4 5/8 in. (18.2 x 12 cm.), black painted wooden frame inlaid with ivory

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The above composition was first illustrated as an engraving and catalogued as 'Allegory for the taking of Warsaw' executed by Giovanni de Piau in Vienna in 1799 after a painting by Gallimberti in Rovieskii's Dictionary of Russian Engraved Portraits (St. Petersburg, 1888), Volume 3, page 2007-2008.
The same engraving is catalogued as such again in A. V. Pomarnotskii, 'Portraits of A. V. Suvorov (Leningrad, 1963), page 51, but with a long footnote printed on page 161.
A. V. Pomarnotskii locates the painting but indicates that the painting is neither dated or signed and underlines the fact that the scholars Rovinskii, Kozlov and Stekonenkhov do not mention anything in their esearch concerning when and where the painting and engraving had been executed.
The discovery of this unknown miniature does at least provide a new date 1772 attached to the name of Francesco Gallimberti, which links the above composition to a specific event during the military career of Suvorov and not the taking of Warsaw, as has long been suggested.