(Cento 1591–1666 Bologna)
The Risen Christ appears to the Virgin,
oil on copper, 38.5 x 28 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private collection, Italy
We are grateful to Nicholas Turner for confirming the attribution after examining the present painting in the original.

The small scale, sketchy handling and the several variations in colour and detail from Guercino’s altarpiece of The Risen Christ Appearing to his Mother in the Pinacoteca Civica, Cento (L. Salerno, I dipinti del Guercino, Rome 1988, no. 127; N. Turner, The paintings of Guercino. A Revised and Expanded Catalogue raisonné, Rome 2017, no. 161), begun in 1628, indicate that this picture on copper is his previously unrecorded bozzetto for it.

The Compagnia del Santissimo Nome di Dio of Cento commissioned the work some five years after the artist’s return to his native city and following his short stay in Rome in 1621–23. He is thought to have completed it in two years.

Many differences in colours may be noted between the small copper sketch and the monumental, finished painting. In the former, Christ’s robe is green-grey rather than the mauve-violet of the final work; the Virgin’s mantle is blue-green, very probably azurite, rather than the more resonant (and expensive) lapis lazuli in the corresponding passage in the altarpiece; the green hanging, top right was substituted in the final result by one of dark blue, while the orange of its lining, repeated in the Virgin’s shawl in the copper, was changed to a cooler yellow ochre for both details in the altarpiece.

There are likewise subtle variations in detail between the bozzetto and altarpiece. In the copper, Christ’s head is less inclined to the left than his eventual counterpart; the Virgin’s outstretched left arm is straighter and shorter than her equivalent’s in the finished result; and an interval of space appears between the open book on the table-top, to the right, and the Virgin’s back, which is lacking in the larger canvas. There are also slight differences between the two versions in the configuration of the fluttering white banner of the Resurrection, in the angle of the long shaft that supports it and in the placing of the end of the shaft as it rests on the ground.

Not all of Guercino’s paintings on copper are exquisitely finished with enamel like effects. Among those that have bozzetto-like handling, such as the present example, is his Penitent Magdalen, formerly in the collection of Luigi Koelliker, Milan, painted in circa 1623 (Guercino: Poesia e sentimento nella pittura del ‘600, ed. by D. Mahon/M. Pulini/V. Sgarbi, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2003, no. 39; Turner, Ibid., 2017, no. 125, repr.). This appears to have been created in preparation for the more finished painting of the subject, on canvas, which is in a private collection in Gaussig, Germany (see Turner, Ibid., 2017, fig. 125.a).

Since the artist and patron lived in the same city, some of the refinements to the composition would have been discussed viva voce. This could also explain why, in this instance, the project was presented to the company more formally than was Guercino’s wont, with patrons living at a greater distance.

We are grateful to Nicholas Turner for cataloguing the present painting.