Giovanni di Pietro Faloppi, called Giovanni da Modena

Amministrazione generale delle regie rendite, Florence (1768–1846) (according to a seal on the reverse);
Raimond van Marle (1887–1936), Perugia.

R. Longhi, Officina ferrarese, Florence 1955, p. 194;
G. Kaftal and F. Bisogni, The iconography of the Saints in the painting of North East Italy, Florence 1978, reproduced fig. 910 (as anonymous North Italian artist);
C. Volpe, 'La pittura gotica. Da Lippo di Dalmasio a Giovanni da Modena', in La basilica di S. Petronio, Milan 1983, vol. I, p. 291, n. 30;
A. de Marchi, 'Faloppi, Giovanni di Pietro', in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, 1994, vol. XLIV, p. 495;
D. Benati and M. Medica, Giovanni da Modena. Un pittore all'ombra di San Petronio, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2014, p. 36, reproduced fig. 27.

The panel is made up of a single plank with an integral frame. There is an old vertical split measuring 18 cm., which runs diagonally through the centre of the panel from the lower margin. There are also two small vertical surface cracks running down from the upper margin either side of the saint's halo, measuring approx. 2 and 3 cm. each, as well as a longer old vertical crack on the left, measuring 9.5 cm. The panel is otherwise in good condition, considering its age. The paint surface is stable and dirty, there are losses to the gold leaf in the saint's halo, and there is a small patch of new gold leaf to the left of the saint's mouth. Inspection under ultraviolet light reveals some old retouching to the halo just above the saint's hair, around the outside edge of the halo and to some of the background. The darks in the folds and shadows of the saint's drapery and the lines in his forehead and hair also fluoresce more darkly, but do not appear to have been strengthened.
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Giovanni da Modena is first recorded in Bologna in 1409. His major surviving work is the fresco decoration of the Bolognini Chapel in San Petronio, Bologna, commissioned by Bartolomeo Bolognini, in his will of 1408. Believed by Andrea de Marchi to be a late work, this panel has been described most recently by Daniele Benati as 'a beautiful Saint Sebastian, dressed in knightly costume'.