Pier Francesco Mola

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This work has clearly not been restored in many years. One can see numerous old small patches and reinforcements on the reverse. The original canvas has a lining, but it is very likely that this added piece of canvas is extremely old and may even be period. There are groups of vertical patches on the right and left sides. There are five other patches in the lower center and one large old patch addressing a hole in the center of the right side in the shaft of the sword. There is no actual restoration to the front for the most part, and certainly none of recent vintage. There is an original canvas join running down the left side of the work, through the bicep and forearm of the figure. It is possible that the lining was added to support this original canvas join. The left and right sides of the work are clearly very old but may not be exactly original to the remainder of the picture. They certainly show more damage, particularly on the right side, where numerous losses and patches of instability are very evident. The support to this canvas and the patches will presumably need to be re-examined, and one would be able to more properly ascertain the condition of the right and left sides with cleaning. The muscular and textured paint layer is in remarkable condition throughout the figure and surrounding areas. The losses in his left wrist and beneath the left wrist in the sword clearly require attention. A handful of other losses, one above the shin, one beneath the calf and one to the left of the thigh of the figure's leg are unrestored, and three other losses beneath the right hand in the hair of Goliath are also clearly visible. The work certainly needs restoration, but care should be taken to retain its marvelous texture and character.
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This newly rediscovered painting by Mola depicting David seated beside the head of Goliath, is in remarkably fresh and untouched condition. Painted during the artist's full maturity, it is set out in a clear geometric design. Movement can be found throughout the work, despite David being shown seated: the torso and head are turned toward the left of the composition in a sudden motion; to the right the arm which holds the sword acts almost as an anchoring device; the leg juts towards the pictorial plane in a strong repoussoir effect. Even the brushtrokes in the background which describe the sky and sunset add tension and dynamism.

A native of the Ticino, Mola and his family moved to Rome by the time he was four years old. By the mid 1630s  and then again in the early 1640s he was in Northern Italy where he absorbed the powerful Lombard interpretation of the Baroque. His evident knowledge of Venetian painting, manifested throughout his oeuvre, suggests he must have visited the Veneto and possibly Venice itself, before training with Francesco Albani in Bologna for two years in the mid 1640s. By 1647 Mola was back in Rome and abandoned the small-scale landscapes of his youth for more ambitious figure paintings such as the present work, moving on from Albani's influence and adopting Guercino's coloring and figure types.

Stylistically the present picture compares closely to the series of reclining males painted in the early 1660s, in Palazzo Chigi, Ariccia, particularly in its studied geometric pose.¹ Mola may even have used the same model. In particular the Bacchus in Ariccia (see fig. 1) shows the same extended leg which forms the strong diagonal, as well as the left hand, with the index finger pointing towards the ground. The artist used a very similar pose, but in reverse, for the figure of John the Baptist in his painting in The Louvre, Paris, and in the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica in Rome.² The head turned away from the outstretched arm is also found in the Preaching of Saint John the Baptist in the National Gallery, London.³ As Francesco Petrucci notes, figures lying in a landscape in a strong diagonal is a characteristic element of Mola's work and is a pictorial adaptation of Gian Lorenzo Bernini's work, in particular his representation of the River Ganges, part of the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi in Piazza Navona, Rome (see fig. 2).

The attribution has been endorsed by Dottor Francesco Petrucci, on whose thoughts this note is dependent.

1. See F. Petrucci, Pier Francesco Mola, Materia e colore nella pittura del '600, Rome 2012, pp. 396-99, cat. nos B125-127, reproduced.
2. Ibid., pp. 360-62, cat. no. B93, reproduced; and p. 363, cat. no. B94, reproduced.
3. Ibid., pp. 310-11, cat. no. B50, reproduced.