(documented in Milan from 1481–1512)
Christ Supported by Two Angels,
tempera on panel, gold ground, 62 x 63 cm, integral frame

Provenance:
Ehrich Gallery, New York;
European private collection

The treatment of the rock on the left in the present painting is reminiscent of landscapes by Mantegna and even more so of those in the miniatures of the Ore di Bona Sforza (British Museum, London) by Giovanni Pietro Birago (circa 1490). Moreover, in terms of style, the angels’ thighs, simultaneously wide and flat, resemble works by Birago as they appear in the bas-de-page scenes of Giovanni Simonetta’s Sforziade (British Museum, London, and National Library, Warsaw). Particularly as to their curly hairstyles, the prototype of these angels can be traced to the painted decoration in the Cappella Colleoni in Bergamo, executed by Amadeo in the 1460s. The gold ground, elaborately embossed with patterns of lozenges and floral motifs, is characteristic of Lombard painting at the Sforza court. The face of Christ is related to that of Micah the Prophet by Bergognone – probably Giovanni Ambrogio Bevilaqua’s teacher – from 1490 (Pinacoteca Brera, Milan).

All of these features indicate that the present panel was painted in Lombardy between 1475 and 1490.
The comparison of the head of Christ in the present painting to that of God the Father in a small oval panel once held in the Cini Collection and now in the Pinacoteca Brera in Milan, bearing an attribution to Giovanni Ambrogio Bevilacqua, consequently also renders this attribution plausible for the present panel. The strongly foreshortened and bent head of Christ recurs in two further works by Bevilacqua’s hand: in the predella of a panel in the Fondazione Bagatti Valsecchi in Milan (c. 1494) and in a panel at the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo in which God’s head appears in a similar position in the throne architecture above the Virgin Mary. Moreover, the pose of the figure of Christ in the present painting is closely related to that of King David in a panel in Brera, bearing Bevilacqua’s signature and the date 1502.

Given its style, the present panel seems to have been executed before the panel in the Fondazione Bagatti Valsecchi, which was painted around 1494. Therefore the present panel could be dated into the 1480s, if it is after the frescoes in Landriano. It is assumed that Giovanni Ambrogio Bevilacqua was born around 1460; he was first mentioned in a register of painters in Milan in 1481. In 1485, he signed and dated his frescoes in the parish church of Landriano.

In 1494, he painted the panel in the Fondazione Bagatti Valsecchi in Milan mentioned above. His last signed work dates from 1502, whereas he was last documented in 1512.

The present painting may have originally formed part of a larger altarpiece. Below the angel on the left-hand side appear parts of a flame and the rays of a halo surrounding a tonsured head. The remnants of these attributes suggest that the painting originally depicted Saint Vincent Ferrer or Saint Bernardino of Siena.

Provenance:
Ehrich Gallery, New York;
sale, Drouot, Paris, 24 February 1975, lot 11;
European private collection

The treatment of the rock on the left in the present painting is reminiscent of landscapes by Mantegna and even m