Offered by Antichità Castelbarco
The Penitent Magdalene
Workshop of Guido Reni (Bologna, 1575 – Bologna, 1642)
Oil on canvas 112 x 89 cm. Framed 130 x 108 cm.
The protagonist of the work is a seductive Saint Mary Magdalene, recognizable for her essential beauty, her disheveled clothes recalling her past as a sinner, and her long, loose hair with blonde highlights falling over her shoulders.
She is depicted in a penitent pose, with her hands delicately clasped in prayer, absorbed in meditation and her gaze full of emotion, evoking repentance, directed toward a cross made of a branch flanked by a skull—typical symbols of her iconography.
She is draped in a soft cloth resting on her shoulders, simple yet characterized by a strong femininity, striking a perfect balance between the sensuality of the sinner and her spiritual asceticism.
Although our Mary Magdalene evokes at first glance the famous composition by Anton Raphael Mengs (Aussig, 1728 – Rome, 1779), now housed at the Prado Museum in Madrid**, it is not actually a contemporary work or one to be linked to the same master, but rather a beautiful 17th-century painting. Mengs’s version, in fact, as is easy to see, dates back to the height of the 18th century and follows a style rooted in the precepts of Neoclassicism, where, compared to the 17th century, the painting has little contrast and the lines are significantly softened by a clear, sharp, and diffused light.
Neoclassical painting, in fact, aimed for a perfect and sublime beauty, drawing inspiration from the examples of classical antiquity. **
As noted in the Prado catalog, Mengs drew upon a lost 17th-century work, which was at the time attributed to the leading exponent of Bolognese classicism, Guidi Reni, and later attributed to his pupil Giovan Gioseffo Dal Sole (1654–1719).
This practice of ‘artistic dialogue across the centuries’ was widespread in Neoclassicism: for example, Pompeo Bartoni, too, for his famous Reclining Magdalene Engaged in Reading, drew upon a celebrated prototype by Correggio, which has also since been lost.
Returning to our painting, we are therefore inclined to attribute its execution to a skilled Baroque painter active in the 17th century, specifically a follower or pupil of Guido Reni, whose workshop produced numerous depictions of the Penitent Magdalene; among these are the famous painting in Palazzo Barberini and the one in the Quimper Musée des Beaux-Arts,, both by Reni himself, or the Penitent Mary Magdalene attributed to Giovan Gioseffo Dal Sole Palazzo Pellegrini a S. Cecilia, Verona, , and finally, Saint Mary Magdalene in Adoration of the Crucifix by Luca Ferrari, also a pupil of Reni (formerly in the collection of Prince R. Pignatelli,
Delevery information :
We take care of and organise the transport of the purchased works, both for Italy and abroad, through professional and insured carriers.
We take great care We personally take care of the packaging, to which we devote a great deal of care: each work is carefully packed, first with arti- cle material, then with a custom-made wooden box.
Should you have the desire to see this or other works in person, we would be happy to welcome you to our gallery in Riva del Garda, Viale Giuseppe Canella 18, we are always open by appointment only.
