No.20 -

Leandro Bassano called Da Ponte (Bassano 1557 - 1622 Venice)
The Annunciation to the Shepherds, oil on canvas, 79, 5 x 65 cm, framed, (Wo)

The present painting, as well as a number of comparable works by Leandro Bassano, are related to an Annunciation by his father Jacopo, today at the Accademia di San Luca in Rome (Inv. No. 99, Arslan I, fig. 148, Arslan II, p. 176). Leandro Bassano created several compositions based on his father’s example, which enjoyed great popularity in Italy and Northern Europe in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Leandro’s most well-known variation of that subject, with a composition in the reverse direction, is at the Museo Civico in Padua (Inv. No. 483, Arslan I, fig. 298, Arslan II, p. 266). The composition in Padua seems to be less well-ordered than the present one; in the former appears a Dominican monk on the right-hand side, which probably has to do with the circumstances surrounding the commission. Unlike our painting, its background features a roughly executed barn interior. In the present work, Leandro was rather inspired by the plain landscape view of his father’s composition. Moreover, the jugs and bowls in the left background are more delicately rendered than in the version at the Museo Civico. It is highly probable that our work is the one that Arslan saw in Bordeaux (Arslan, p. 333, Lacaze Collection; unfortunately this collection has not been published in a catalogue, but the provenance suggests that Arslan has listed the work in question). A highly similar version by Leandro, dated to 1590, is preserved at the Cummer Museum of Art in Jacksonville, Florida. Aegidius Sadeler engraved Jacopo Bassano’s nocturnal Annunciation in the reverse direction, thus inspiring a great number of imitators, including Abraham Bloemaert (comp. Aikema, p. 167, figs. 138, 139).
Literature: comp. Eduardo Arslan, I Bassano, 2 vols., Milan 1960, vol. I, p. 333, probably identical to the painting described there; Ludwig Zottmann, Zur Kunst der Bassani, Strasbourg 1908; Bernard Aikema, Jacopo Bassano and his Public, Princeton 1996.
Provenance: probably Lacaze Collection, Bordeaux, 1960; private property, France
Certificate: Prof. Egidio Martini, as an autograph work by Leandro Bassano (written communication of 13 December 2007).

estimate €15.000,- to €19.000,-

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