Lot 255: STUDIO OF JUSEPE DE RIBERA, CALLED LO SPAGNOLETTO JÁTIVA, VALENCIA 1591 - 1652 NAPLES

50 by 35 1/2 in.; 127 by 90.1 cm.

oil on canvas

Though not directly based on a known composition by Ribera, the present painting is inspired by Ribera's treatment of the subject in the Museo de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid (reproduced in N. Spinosa, L'opera completa del Ribera, Milan 1978, p. 95, cat. no. 27). The Madrid picture, which is signed in monogram and generally dated to circa 1620, shows a three-quarter-length Christ in marked chiaroscuro, but the head of Christ in the present composition is much closer to that in Ribera's Ecce Homo in Bob Jones University Museum, Greenville, South Carolina, which is signed and dated 1638 (see Spinosa, op. cit., p. 113, cat. no. 123, reproduced p. 112, fig. 123). It is, therefore, likely that this picture was painted by an artist working in Ribera's circle in Naples during the fourth or fifth decade of the 17th Century.