Roman School, 1620s

Wilhelm Suida (1877-1959), Graz, by 1914;

Thence by descent in his family;

By whom anonymously sold ("Property from a Private Collection"), New York, Sotheby's, 5 June 2008, lot 8 (as Roman School, circa 1600);

Where acquired by Aso O. Tavitian.

L. Mortari, Francesco Salviati, Rome 1992, p. 157, cat. no. 160, reproduced (as not by Salviati).

While this freely executed painting has yet to be firmly attributed, it must have been conceived by a highly talented artist working in Rome during the 1620s. Indeed, the work’s quality, especially evident in the subtle facial modeling of the woman’s handsome features, remains unmistakable. Her naturalistic rendering, achieved through subtle gradations of light and shade, demonstrates Caravaggio’s enduring influence on painters working in seventeenth-century Rome.

When in the collection of the pioneering art historian Wilhelm Suida in the early twentieth century, the painting was thought to be the work of Francesco Salviati, undoubtedly due to the woman’s strongly defined features. However, the casual nature of her pose—conveyed through her averted gaze and diagonally turned shoulders, which imbue the work with a sense of movement—points to a later hand. The woman’s simple attire and loosely styled auburn air, coupled with this informality, give the work with a strikingly timeless wistfulness. 

We are grateful to Yuri Primarosa for proposing an attribution to Giuseppe Vermiglio (1587-1635) and a date of execution of circa 1620.