Friday, July 1, 2022

Nicolò dell'Abate (ca. 1509-1571) - Emilia to Fontainebleau

Nicolò dell'Abate
The Story of Aeneas
Laocoön and his Sons

ca. 1540
detached fresco
Galleria Estense, Modena

Nicolò dell'Abate
The Story of Aeneas
Escape from Troy with Anchises and Ascanius
ca. 1540
detached fresco
Galleria Estense, Modena

Nicolò dell'Abate
Marriage of a Patrician Couple
ca. 1540-45
oil on paper (grisaille)
Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Nicolò dell'Abate
Battle Scene
1546
detached fresco
Galleria Estense, Modena

Nicolò dell'Abate
Portrait of a Man with a Falcon
ca. 1548
oil on canvas
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

Nicolò dell'Abate
Portrait of a Young Man
before 1571
oil on canvas
private collection

Nicolò dell'Abate
Passion of Christ Cycle
The Flagellation and the Crowning with Thorns
ca. 1560
fresco
Château de Villesavin, Val de Loire

attributed to Nicolò dell'Abate
Pandora
ca. 1555
oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre

Nicolò dell'Abate
The Continence of Scipio
ca. 1555
oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre

Nicolò dell'Abate
Cupid and Psyche
ca. 1550-70
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Nicolò dell'Abate
Faun and Nymph
ca. 1550-70
oil on canvas
Nasjonalmuseet, Oslo

Nicolò dell'Abate
Venus
before 1571
oil on panel
Christ Church, University of Oxford

Nicolò dell'Abate
The Finding of Moses
ca. 1560
oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre

Nicolò dell'Abate
Orpheus and Eurydice
ca. 1552-71
oil on canvas
National Gallery, London

Nicolò dell'Abate
Abduction of Proserpine
ca. 1570
oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre

"Nicolò dell'Abate belongs to the generation of Vasari and Salviati.  Like Primaticcio, he was to conclude his career in France, but not until he had worked (mostly as a fresco decorator) until just past the mid century in the neighbourhood of his native town of Modena and then in Bologna.  . . .  The Bologna into which Nicolò had come was no longer the enclave of retardataire Raphaelism it had been; it was now effectively a centre of the new Maniera, proselytized by Vasari, Salviati, and the effect – finally fully realized in Bologna – of Parmigianino's art.  In this climate Nicolò's last Italian works became what they previously had not quite been: explicit examples of Maniera style.  But the last edge to his new sophistication, and his highest accomplishment in this style, were yet to come, after Primaticcio's tutelage at Fontainebleau.  The last two, and the finest, decades of his career belong to the history of the school in France."

– S.J. Freedberg, Painting in Italy 1500-1600 in the Pelican History of Art series (1970)