Sold Without Reserve | GIUSTO DE' MENABUOI | TWO EVANGELISTS; SAINT GREGORY THE GREAT; SAINT JEROME; SAINT MARGARET OF HUNGARY; SAINT DOMINIC

Probably, the Monastery of the Vergini alla Vettabbia, Milan, 1363;

Raoul Tolentino;

His sale, New York, American Art Association, 8-11 December 1926, lot 759 (as Manner of Giovanni da Milano);

Mrs. Harry Hatry;

Thence by bequest to the Stamford Museum and Nature Center, 1956;

By whom sold, New York, Sotheby's, 24 January 2008, lot 35;

There acquired by G. Sarti Antiques, London;

From whom acquired, November 2010. 

R. Longhi, "Calepino veneziano. I. Il polittico di Giusto de'Menabuoi per suor Isotta Terzaghi (1363)," in Arte veneta, vol. II, 1947, p. 79-80, reproduced figs. 77-78 (reprint in Edizione delle opere complete di R.Longhi, vol. X, Florence, 1978, pp. 65-66, reproduced figs 168 b-c);

F. Russoli, "Giusto de Menabuoi: S. Paolo, S. Agostino, S. Caterina, S. Giovanni Battista, S. Tomaso d'Aquino, S. Antonio abate," in Arte lombarda dai Visconti agli Sforza, exhibition catalogue, Milan 1958, p. 16, under cat. nos. 36-40;

S. Bettini, Le pitture di Giusto de' Menabuoi nel Battistero del Duomo di Padova, Venice 1960, pp. 12-13;

L. Castelfranchi Vegas, Giusto de' Menabuoi, Milan 1966, n.p;

F. R. Shapley, Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection, Italian Schools, XIII-XV Century, London, 1966, p. 39, under cat. nos. K179, K231 A/B and K1122 A/B, note 3;

B. Berenson, Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Central Italian and North Italian Schools, vol. I, London 1968, p. 198;

R. Longhi, Lavori in Valpadana dal Trecento al Primo Cinquecento, 1934-1964, Florence 1973, pp. 236 and 256, reproduced fig. 139 (where he reconstructed the altarpiece from which these six paintings originated placing them along the bottom of the altarpiece);

B.J. Delaney, Giusto de' Menabuoi: Iconography and Style, Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia Unversity, New York 1972, pp. 331-333;

Dizionario enciclopedico Bolaffi dei pittori e degli incisori italiani : dall' XI al XX secolo, Turin 1975, vol. vii, p. 346;

B.J. Delaney, "Giusto de' Menabuoi in Lombardy," in The Art Bulletin, vol. 58, no. 1, March 1976, p. 21 (as location unknown);

A. Volpe, "Giusto de'Menabuoi, S. Ambrogio," in Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna. Doni acquisti depositi. Le acquisizioni degli ultimi dieci anni 1987-1997, exhibition catalogue, Bologna 1997, p. 62;

A. Volpe, "Giusto de' Menabuoi, S. Ambrogio," in Percorsi del barocco: acquisti, doni e depositi alla Pinacoteca nazionale di Bologna: 1990-1999, exhibition catalogue, Bologna 1999, p. 14;

C. Travi, "Johanes de Mediolano, Justus de Florentia e la pittura su tavola in Lombardia nel XIV secolo," in Giovanni da Milano, exhibition catalogue, Florence 2008, and p. 84, reproduced fig. p.72, and pp. 166-173, cat no. 9, reproduced fig. p.169;

C. Travi, in From Gothic Tradition to the Renaissance: Italian painting from the 14th and 15th centuries, exhibition catalogue, Paris 2008, pp. 72-83, reproduced. 

These half-length saints once likely formed part of the second register of a now dismembered polyptych completed by Giusto de’ Menabuoi in Milan in 1363 for the Terzaghi, an important Milanese family [1].  The date and patron's name are inscribed on the central panel of the altarpiece, which depicts a Madonna and Child Enthroned with a Kneeling Yxotta de Terzago and another donatrix (formerly in the Schiff Collection and today in the Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Reale in Pisa) [2]. Flanking this central piece would have been six full length saints—Anthony Abbot, Thomas Aquinas, John the Baptist, Catherine of Alexandria, Paul and Augustine (University of Georgia, Georgia Museum of Art, Kress Collection) [3]. The present panels would have likely filled the empty spaces between the upper sections of the full-length saints, an idea reinforced by two small roundel prophets of similar dimensions at the upper corners of the Schiff Madonna. Though small in size, these panels are a testament to the formative years of the Florentine-born artist's early career in Lombardy, where he was active until around 1370, when he moved to Padua.

1. For a more complete reconstruction of the polyptych, see Delaney 1976, op. cit., pp. 20-22, figs. 1-6.  

2.  ibid., fig. 4. 

3. See Shapley, op. cit.