Bernardo Daddi

Von Bartsch Collection, Berlin (according to Offner, see Literature);
With Galerie van Diemen, Berlin;
Kammerherr Fritz von Goldammer, Frankfurt-am-Main (1866-1927), by whom acquired from the above in 1923 or 1924;
His widow, Frau Else von Goldammer (1878-1950), Frankfurt and Berlin;
Thence by inheritance to the great-great-nephew of the above;
With Albrecht Neuhaus, Würzburg;
Acquired from the above by the father of the present owner in1986.

Frankfurt, Städelschen Kunstinstitut, Austellung von Meisterwerken alter Malerei aus Privatbesitz, 1925, no. 54.

O. Götz, Leihausstellung aus Privatebesitz in Städelschen Kunstinstitut, in Der Cicerone, XVII, 1925, p. 733;
Austellung von Meisterwerken alter Malerei, exhibition catalogue, Frankurt 1925, p. 14, no. 49;
Austellung von Meisterwerken alter Malerei, exhibition catalogue, Frankfurt 1925, p. 19, no. 54;
B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance, Oxford 1932, p. 165 (as by Daddi);
B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance, Milan 1936, p. 143 (as by Daddi);
J. Cibulka, "Bernardo Daddi a jeho dva Triptychy v Národni Galerii v Praha", in Uméni, vol. XIII, 1940-41, pp. 347-361 (as by Daddi);
R. Offner, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Section III, vol. V, New York 1947, p. 114, n.1 (as close following of Daddi) ;
D. Shorr, The Christ Child in devotional images in Italy during the XIV Century, New York 1954, pp. 96-97, 101 (as following of Daddi);
B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Florentine School, London 1963, vol. I, p. 52 (as shop of Daddi);
M. Boskovits, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Section III, vol. IX, Florence 1984, p. 351, n.2 (as by Daddi);
M. Boskovits, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Section III, vol. IV, Bernardo Daddi, his shop and following, Florence 1991, pp. 17, 72-75, 76 n. 2, 315 and 512), reproduced plate VI, VI¹ (as by Bernardo Daddi);
E.S. Skaug, Punch marks from Giotto to Fra Angelico..., Oslo 1994, vol. I, p. 100.

The following condition repport is provided by Sarah Walden who is an external specialist and not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting is on a poplar panel, which has suffered quite wide worm damage at the back in the lower half. This has been strengthened with plaster, and the outer side edges behind have recent wooden inserts in this lower area. There is no sign of worm damage on the face of the painting, but minor retouching up slight cracks from the base on either side, but no other trace of movement at all. Old craquelure across the foreground has a little old retouching, and at some moment in the past a rather wide loss occurred in the gold background just above the two angels at upper left. The gilding around the frame has been slightly strengthened at upper right, and the halo of the Madonna has some detail retouchings. There are occasional minor little old losses, slight chips for instance in the beard and hair of St John, and minor marks on the Child. The brocading at the back of the throne has very fine shell gold detail intact, and even the blue robe of the Madonna has retained its colour. Overall the painting is in rather unusually beautiful condition generally. This report was not done under laboratory conditions.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

This remarkably preserved and beautiful little panel originally formed the centre of a small portable altarpiece or tabernacle, and was painted in Florence around 1340 for the private devotional use of a patron whose identity is now sadly lost to us. Its author, Bernardo Daddi, was one of the most important painters in the early 14th century in Florence, and is generally thought to have been a pupil and associate of Giotto himself. To the latter's monumental style Daddi brought a gracefulness and refinement of colour, and in both these respects as well as its scale this panel epitomises the crucial contribution he made to the development of the portable altarpiece in fourteenth-century Florence.

The appearance of Daddi's original tabernacle can be reconstructed, for the two wings are known to have survived, although their present whereabouts are now unknown (figs. 1 and 2). Originally in the collection of Count Alexander von Benckendorff (1849-1917) in Copenhagen and then London, they were last recorded in the collection of the Hon. Lady Ridley, by whose executors they were sold in these Rooms on the 24 June 1970, lot 108.¹  In the central panel here, the Madonna and Child are shown enthroned, with Saints John the Baptist and Peter before them and flanked by four angels, towards one of whom the Christ Child playfully extends his fingers. In the left hand wing Saint Mary Magdalene is shown embracing the empty Cross, with the angel of the Annunciation above her and Saints Augustine(?) and Anthony Abbot below. The right wing mirrors this design, with the Crucifixion in the centre, the Virgin Annunciate above and Mary and Saint John at the foot of the Cross. The tender attitudes and gestures of the Madonna and her Son and the smiling faces of the four angels, combined with Daddi's gift for lyrical line and decoration typify the new style of such small-scale devotional works. The beautiful volumetric representation of the Virgin's robes recalls Daddi's celebrated triptych in the Seilern Collection in London, which is dated 1338.²  The beautiful embroidered draperies are equally typical of this period and may reflect the influence of contemporary Sienese painters such as the Lorenzetti; brocades similar to that hanging behind the Madonna and Child recur in other of Daddi's works, for example the left leaf of a Diptych showing the Madonna and Child with Saints Bernard, Francis, Augustine and John the Baptist in the Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte in Naples, and similarly the Horne Diptych in Florence.³  The basic design of this and other related tabernacles and panels produced by Daddi and his shop probably goes back to the signed panel of The Madonna and Child with Saints Peter and Paul and eight angels in the Accademia in Florence, which is signed and was originally indistinctly dated 1333(?).⁴ The small size of such panels clearly provided Daddi with the ideal format with which to display his technical accomplishments and also his unceasing inventivess of gesture and design and they remain the works in which his most individual qualities are to be found.

Daddi's skill in this format was part of a larger trend in Florentine painting in the second quarter of the fourteenth century, in which artists followed what Offner termed a 'miniaturist tendency' in contrast to Giotto's more monumental style. Daddi himself had occupied a senior position in Giotto's workshop, but he was also evidently aware of the early phases of this development in the work of contemporaries such as the Saint Cecilia Master. Of  his life and career we know some details. He probably matriculated in the Florentine Painters' Guild, the Arte dei Medici e Speziali around 1320.  His earliest dated work is from 1328 and he was active for a further twenty years before his death (probably from plague) in 1348. His most important panel paintings include a triptych from the Ognissanti of 1333 (Florence, Bigallo), the high altarpiece of San Pancrazio of circa 1340 (Florence, Uffizi) and the Madonna and Child with eight angels painted for Or San Michele of 1347. But it was with small-scale works such as this that he probably had a greater impact. Daddi's workshop grew greatly in importance and productivity after 1330 and increasingly catered for the growing private demand for devotional panel painting, pioneering the development of private miniature tabernacles such as this. The present panel is a perfect example of Daddi's lyrical and colourful style which he and his shop evolved to meet this demand, and his success in this vein exercised a profound influence on Florentine painting for a generation or more after his death.   

This panel, together with the diptych leaf by Daddi and the portable tabernacle by Jacopo del Casentino in this sale (see lots 1 and 3), came from a collection formed in the 1920s by Fritz von Goldammer in Frankfurt. The collection contained a number of early pictures of both the Italian and German schools, including, for example, lot 175 and 176 in the Day Sale session of this catalogue. Perhaps his most notable acquisition was the Virgin and Child crowned by angels by Martin Schongauer (c.1445-1491) sold in these Rooms, 7 July 2005, lot 26 and today at Compton Verney.

 

1. Boskovits, op. cit., 1991, p. 76, plate VI² with reconstruction reproduced pl. VI. The association of the Goldammer and ex-Beckendorff panels was first made by Federico Zeri.
2. See, for example, H. Braham, in the catalogue of the exhibition The Princes Gate Collection, London, Courtauld Institute Galleries, 1981, p. 10, no. 14, reproduced in colour.
3. B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Florentine School , London 1963, vol. I, p. 55, reproduced fig. 169 and Boskovits, op. cit. 1991, pp. 49-50, reproduced.
4. R. Offner and K. Steinweg, ed. M. Boskovits and M. Gregori, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. The works of Bernardo Daddi, Florence 1989, p. 166, reproduced.