Old Masters Day Sale, including portrait miniatures
Old Masters Day Sale, including portrait miniatures
Property from a European Private Collection
Onorio Marinari
An Allegory of Peace
Lot Closed
December 8, 03:25 PM GMT
Estimate
20,000 - 30,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
Property from a European Private Collection
Onorio Marinari
Florence 1627 - 1716
An Allegory of Peace
oil on canvas
unframed: 86.9 x 67 cm.; 34¼ x 26⅜ in.
framed: 105.4 x 87.5 cm.; 41½ x 34½ in.
By whom sold, Christie's, London, 25 November 1938, lot 5 (as Amiconi) for £12–12s to L Browne.
Despite this painting's traditional attribution to Carlo Dolci, the correct authorship of this work to his cousin, the Florentine Onorio Marinari, has now been reasserted. Marinari's delicate handling and shimmering sense of colour is found throughout the work and remains remarkably preserved underneath a thick layer of discoloured varnish.
The identification of this figure as an Allegory of Peace comes from Cesare Ripa's Iconologia, which describes one manifestation of peace as a 'Woman... holding a statuette in the right hand, and the left is placed on a pedestal, where there is a chalice, and with said hand she supports an olive branch'.1 The statuette, Ripa explains, is symbolic of peace being the patron and supporter of human craftsmen, who cannot learn and practice their art during the distractions and thoughts of war.
We are grateful to Dr Silvia Benassai for endorsing the attribution to Onorio Marinari on the basis of digital images.
1 C. Ripa, Iconologia, Venice 1645, vol. II, p. 467.