Lot 202: Giovanni Battista Vanni (Florence 1600-1660 Pistoia)

The Madonna and Child with an Angel
oil on canvas
48 3/8 x 38 7/8 in. (122.9 x 98.7 cm.)
with inventory number '343' (stencilled on the reverse)

L. Salerno, 'Caravaggio e i caravaggeschi', Storia dell'Arte, 1970, 7-8, p. 246, fig. 3.
F. Baldassari, 'Giovan Battista Vanni', Il Seicento Fiorentino. Arte a Firenze da Ferdinando I a Cosimo III. Biografie, exhibition catalogue, Florence, 1986, p. 181.

Giovanni Battista Vanni first studied with Aurelio Lomi and Matteo Rosselli. He then entered the 'Accademia' of Jacopo da Empoli, where he learnt to draw 'non solo con franchezza, ma con pulitezza e leggiadria', as stated by the biographer Francesco Baldinucci (Notizie dei Professori del Disegno da Cimabue in qua..., Florence, ed. 1846, p. 546). Soon afterwards he studied with Cristofano Allori. and Giovanni Bilivert. The Miracle of Saint Benedictus (Carrara, Cassa di Risparmio) is his first known painting, dateable to circa 1620. At about this time, he collaborated with Matteo Rosselli, notably on the Casino Mediceo, working closely with Jacopo Vignali and Domenico Pugliani. Around Easter 1624, Vanni was recorded in Rome, with Riminaldi, Vouet and Poussin and by 1629 he was in Parma, busy copying and studying Correggio and engraving all the frescoes of the dome of the Duomo, before returning to Rome in 1630.

Francesca Baldassari (loc. cit.) dates the present painting, which she describes as Correggesque although anticipating the atmospheric spirit of Pietro da Cortona, whom he met in 1637, to the beginning of the 1630s. From 1632 onwards, Vanni worked in Florence with both Orazio Fidani and Mario Balassi.

We are grateful to Francesca Baldassari for confirming the attribution to Giovanni Battista Vanni after inspection of the original.

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