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  • possibly a jug
    Type: watermark (indistinguishable)
    Location:
    Materials:
  • "No 238 V. Salembeni"
    Type: inscription
    Location: verso
    Materials: pen and brown ink
  • "V. Salembert"
    Type: inscription
    Location: former mount (removed)
    Materials:
  • "65/93/No. 305-6"
    Type: inscription
    Location: former mount
    Materials:
  • Amsterdam Art Dealer, Auctioneer & Collector, Jan Pietersz. Zomer, died in 1724 (Lugt 1511)
    Type: collector's mark
    Location:
    Materials:
  • Jan Pietersz. Zomer( Dealer and Collector, ) - .
    (1641-1724)
  • James Bowdoin III( Collector, Boston) - 1811.
  • Bowdoin College Museum of Art( Museum, Brunswick, Maine) 1811- . Bequest
  • Old Master Drawings at Bowdoin College
    • Bowdoin College Museum of Art. ( 5/17/1985 - 7/7/1985)
    • Clark Art Institute. ( 9/14/1985 - 10/27/1985)
    • University of Kansas. ( 1/19/1986 - 3/2/1986)
    • Art Gallery of Ontario. ( 5/17/1986 - 6/29/1986)
  • Drawing on Basics
    • Bowdoin College Museum of Art. ( 10/14/1993 - 12/19/1993)
  • Monotheism & Masculinity
    • Bowdoin College Museum of Art. ( 10/5/2004 - 11/7/2004)
Type: catalogue
Author: Henry Johnson
Document Title: Catalogue of the Bowdoin College Art Collections
Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine
Reference: no. 61
Remarks: (as "Salembert")
Section Title: Pt. I, The Bowdoin Drawings
Date: 1885

Type: catalogue
Author: Bowdoin College Museum of Art
Document Title: Bowdoin Museum of Fine Arts, Walker Art Building
Edition: 4th
Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine
Reference: no. 66
Remarks: (as Salembeni)
Publisher: Bowdoin College
Section Title: Descriptive Catalogue of the . . .
Date: 1930

Type: exhibition catalogue
Author: David P. Becker
Document Title: Old Master Drawings at Bowdoin College
Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine
Location: pp. 82-83
Reference: no. 37 (illus.)
Publisher: Bowdoin College
Date: 1985
			
		

Scholars have recently dismissed the traditional attribution of this sheet to the Sienese painter Ventura Salimbeni (1568—1613) but have not been able to assign another name to it.1 Suggestions by Nicholas Turner and Philip Pouncey have placed it in the Emilian region.2 The elaborate technique of overlays of white wash and pen accents was used in drawings by such artists as Bernardino Gatti and Giorgio Gandini, and the facial expressions have reminded Mr. Pouncey of the work of Michelangelo Anselmi.3 This work is not a traditional sketch or a preliminary study but could be either a very careful record of a larger work or perhaps a small presentation drawing. The attributes of a cross with a lily and a crown of thorns identify the female saint as St. Catherine of Siena, reinforcing (but not necessitating) a Sienese origin for this sheet. The saint is seen receiving the flaming heart from Christ to be placed within her own breast.4

1. Susan Wegner first denied the Salimbeni attribution in 1980.

2. Turner tentatively suggested Gatti, and Pouncey thought possibly near either Perino del Vaga or Anselmi.

3. For characteristic drawings by these artists and the most recent literature, see De Grazia 1984.

4. The iconography was pointed out to the author by Susan Wegner in conversation, 1984.

Commentary credited to David P. Becker (or not otherwise captioned) appeared in his catalogue Old Master Drawings at Bowdoin College (Brunswick: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 1985).