Governor William W. Scranton and First Lady Mary L. Scranton, Pennsylvania;
Thence by descent in the family.
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 seems to be in very respectable condition. The only restorations clearly visible under ultraviolet light are in St John's halo on the far right, and in the halo of the Madonna in the upper center. However, one can see that there has been some weakness in the upper sky on both sides of the Madonna, which has attracted some retouches. These retouches seem to extend into the trees on either side of the Madonna, particularly in the darker colors. There are numerous thin cracks in the panel, two of which run through the figure of Christ and a couple of others in the lower center and lower right. The panel is cradled. It is possible that there is a small addition on the right side of about 1 inch. Some attention to the varnish and some of these cracks would make this picture quite presentable.
"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."
Giuliano di Piero di Simone Bugiardini was active in Florence during the height of activity of that city's Renaissance. He was a pupil of Domenico Ghirlandaio, the scion of official Florentine taste, and Piero di Cosimo, a representative of its more eccentric aspects. In his youth, he was an assistant to Fra Bartolommeo and Mariotto Albertinelli. Bugiardini did not limit his artistic studies to painting, but was a pupil also of the sculptor Bertoldo di Giovanni in the garden Academy sponsored by Lorenzo the Magnificent at the Medici villa at San Marco. It was there that he could have met Michelangelo, who became his lifelong friend. Michelangelo felt comfortable enough with Bugiardini to invite him to Rome in order to learn the art of painting
buon fresco which Michelangelo needed in order to complete his commission to paint the Sistine ceiling. And it was Bugiardini who tended to the seriously ill Buonarroti in the summer and fall of 1531.
Bugiardini was patronized by a number of influential and notable persons, including the Rucellai family, for whom he painted the strikingly original Martyrdom of Saint Catherine for the family chapel in Santa Maria Novella, Florence, where it remains in sitù. Bugiardini was particularly successful in his works for private veneration, such as the present example, which show a mastery of invention and color, and which are of a size and format suited to his artistic temperament and talents. Through this Madonna and Child with Saint John the Baptist, Bugiardini displays an awareness of the paintings of Raphael, as well, of course, to his friend Michelangelo. The compositional device of the Madonna holding an open book is a direct reference to Michelangelo, specifically to his drawing of the Madonna del Silenzio in the collection of the Duke of Portland. Laura Pagnotta dates the present composition, for which there exists another version in a private Italian collection (L. Pagnotta, Giuliano Bugiardini, Milan 1987, p. 223, cat. no. 71, reproduced fig. 71.), to just after circa 1538, based on the dating of the Duke of Portland Michelangelo drawing.
