The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew, a drawing by Alessandro Casolani

This powerful pen and brown ink wash drawing is a study for an altarpiece depicting The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew. Signed and dated 1604, it was painted at the end of his life by Alessandro Casolani, one of the last representatives of Sienese Mannerism, for the nave of the church of San Niccolo al Carmine in Siena, where it is still preserved.

Although very close to the final composition, our drawing features several morbid details that will be considerably toned down in the final painted composition. It was part of the drawings from Portuguese collections which were exhibited in several prestigious European museums (including the Prado in Madrid) in 2000-2002.

1. Alessandro Casolani, a late Sienese mannerist influenced by Federico Barocci

Born in Mensano, a hamlet in the municipality of Casole d'Elsa, near Siena, Alessandro Casolani received his first artistic training in Siena, probably with Arcangelo Salimbeni (ca. 1536 - 1579), a disciple of Domenico Beccafumi (c. 1486 - 1531) and Ventura's father. In 1578, Casolani visited Rome, where he familiarized himself with the painting of Federico Barocci.

Returning to Siena in 1581, Casolani quickly became one of the city's most fashionable painters, receiving commissions from the powerful societies of S. Caterina and SS Trinità, as well as from the public magistracy. Outside Siena, he painted frescoes for the Carthusian monastery and the church of San Tommaso in Pavia.

2. A composition with morbid details that will be greatly toned down in its final version

Saint Bartholomew was one of Christ's apostles. According to the Golden Legend, he undertook a missionary journey to India and then Armenia, where he met an atrocious death by being flayed alive and crucified for refusing to worship idols.

In this drawing, the details of St. Bartholomew's martyrdom, surrounded by his three executioners, are depicted with a rather morbid, if not humorless, precision! The saint's wrists are attached to a horizontal wooden plank suspended above his head and linked to the column behind him. The plank is hoisted up by the rope held by the executioner shown standing on the right of the composition, while his colleague on the left begins to butcher the saint's right arm with both hands, holding his knife between his teeth. A third executioner, crouching on the right, is about to cut off the saint's left leg skin, while a small dog on the left is lapping up the blood on the floor...

While faithful to the overall composition, the altarpiece in the church of San Niccolo al Carmine (pictures in the gallery) presents a much toned-down version: the two knife-wielding executioners are shown cutting into the saint's arm and leg respectively, but the detail of the dog feasting on the martyr's blood has been replaced by a group of women seated on the steps of the execution site.

The painting, completed in 1604, was praised by Cardinal Federigo Borromeo during his visit to the Carmine on March 27, 1605.

The style of this drawing, characterized by light pen strokes reinforced by touches of dark wash, reveals the strong influence of Federico Barocci (c. 1535 - 1612) and has much in common with the "Barocceschi Senesi", the Sienese disciples of the famous Urbino-born painter: Francesco Vanni (1563-1610) (of whom we also present a drawing for sale) and Ventura Salimbeni (1568 - 1613), two artists from a slightly younger generation than Casolani, who like him have adopted many elements of Barocci's fluid pictorial style and devout imagery.

In his catalog published in 2000, Nicolas Turner compared the style and composition of this drawing with a drawing by Ventura Salimbeni depicting The Death of St. Clare with Pope Innocent IV Blessing her (last picture in the gallery), preparatory to a fresco painted in 1599 in the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Assisi.

3. Framing

Our drawing is presented in a sober 17th-century Italian fruitwood frame, adorned with an elegant corbin beak molding.

Provenance: Private collection, Lisbon - Portugal
Sotheby's London, July 2, 1997, Lot 123

Exhibitions : Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (United Kingdom) - European Master Drawings from Portuguese Collections (1500 - 1800), (16 May to 13 August 2000) Cat. Nr. 28
Centro cultural de Belém, Lisbon (Portugal) Desenhos de mestres europeus em colecções portuguesas (October-December 2000), Cat. Nr. 28
Museu Nacional Soares Dos Reis, Porto (Portugal) Desenhos de mestres europeus em colecções portuguesas, (October-December 2001), Cat. Nr. 28
Museu Nacional del Prado, Madrid (Spain) Dibujos de maestros europeus en las colecciones portuguesas (1500-1800), 2002, Cat. Nr. 18

Literature: This drawing is reproduced in Nicholas Turner's catalog (European Master Drawings from Portuguese collections) for the exhibition at the Centro Cultural de Belem in 2000 (pages 72 & 73).