One of the greatest works by the Italian Baroque master Domenichino (1581-1641) is to remain in Britain and is now on public display in Room 32 of the National Gallery, having been acquired by an anonymous private collector. This is a tremendous outcome for the nation and a triumph of collaboration between the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) and the anonymous private collector, resulting from the application of the Ridley Rules.
Saint John the Evangelist (1620s) is the finest painting by Domenichino to remain in private hands and the most important example of his work in this country. Measuring 259 x 199 cm, this monumental oil painting is a must-see highlight for visitors to the Italian Baroque rooms of the National Gallery.
Domenico Zampieri, called Domenichino, was one of the main followers of Annibale Carracci. He had probably arrived in Rome by 1602, when Annibale was working in the Palazzo Farnese. Domenichino was important as a painter of classical landscape, following Annibale. The Gallery contains a series of frescoes on mythological themes that he painted for the Villa Aldobrandini at Frascati.
Domenichino was born at Bologna, son of a shoemaker, and there initially studied under Denis Calvaert. After quarreling with Calvaert, he left to work in the Accademia degli Incamminati of the Carracci where, because of his small stature, he was nicknamed Domenichino, meaning "little Domenico" in Italian. He left Bologna for Rome in 1602 and became one of the most talented apprentices to emerge from Annibale Carracci's supervision. As a young artist in Rome he lived with his slightly older Bolognese colleagues Albani and Guido Reni, and worked alongside Lanfranco, who later would become a chief rival.
Following Annibale Carracci's death in 1609, Annibale's Bolognese pupils, foremost Domenichino, Albani, Reni and Lanfranco, became the leading painters in Rome (Caravaggio had left Rome in 1606 and his followers there did not compete successfully with the Bolognese for fresco or altarpiece commissions). One of Domenichino's masterpieces, his frescoes of Scenes of the Life of Saint Cecilia in the Polet Chapel of San Luigi dei Francesi, was commissioned in 1612 and completed in 1615. Concurrently he painted his first, and most celebrated, altarpiece, The Last Communion of St. Jerome for the church of San Girolamo della Carit‡ (signed and dated, 1614). It subsequently would be judged as being comparable to Raphael's great Transfiguration and even as "the best picture in the world."
In addition to his interest in the theory of painting (he was well educated and bookish), Domenichino was devoted to music, not as a performer but to the invention of instruments suited to the stile moderno or to what Monteverdi dubbed the seconda pratica. Like Domenichino's paintings, its sources were in ancient models and aimed at clarity of expression capable of moving its audience. As the Florentine composer Giulio Caccini held and Domenichino surely believed, the aim of the composer/artist was to "move the passion of the mind." To achieve that goal, Domenichino paid particular attention to expressive gestures, to what are called the affetti. Some 1750 drawings in the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle attest to the assiduous study underlying Domenichino's workófigural, architectural, decorative, landscape, even caricatureóand to the painter's brilliance as a draftsman. In Roger de Piles' Balance of 1708, an effort to quantify and compare the greatness of painters in four categories (no artist ever achieved a score above 18 in any category), the French critic awarded Domenichino 17 points for drawing (dessein), 17 for expression, 15 for composition, yet only 9 as a colorist (coloris). Domenichino's composite score of 58 nonetheless was surpassed only by Raphael and Rubens, and it equalled that of the Carracci.
The Balance reflects Domenichino's high standing in the history of European tasteóuntil John Ruskin in the 1840s wrote his devastating attacks on Bolognese Baroque painting in his Modern Painters. The Carracci and their followers were condemned by Ruskin as being "insincere" (for Ruskin, there was no entirely sincere or great art in the seventeenth century), and doubly damned as being "eclectic." Modern scholarship, led by Luigi Serra, John Pope-Hennessy, Evelina Borea and Richard Spear, who in 1982 published the first catalogue raisonnÈ of all of Domenichino's paintings and preparatory drawings, have resurrected the artist from the Victorian graveyard and reestablished his place among the most important and influential painters of seventeenth-century Italy. In 1996 the first major exhibition of his work was held at the Palazzo Venezia in Rome.
With regard to its new private acquisiton (shown right), National Gallery curator Dawson Carr said: "Depictions of divine inspiration were a mainstay of Baroque artists, and the heroic pose and focused, serene gaze of Domenichinoís figure make it one of the finest interpretations of the classical tradition.
"Although Domenichino is well represented in UK public and private collections, none of the paintings can equal the grand scale and conception of this, one of his greatest easel paintings. It is undoubtedly the best work by the artist remaining in private hands and its export would have been lamentable for the representation of Italian Baroque painting in this country."
This successful outcome comes just months after the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) placed an export licence deferral on the painting, owing to its outstanding aesthetic importance. It had already been sold to an overseas buyer for £9,225,250 at an auction in December 2009.
With the export licence deferral in place, a new collector came forward wishing to acquire the painting, to keep it in the UK and to make provision for its regular public display. This agreement was made in accordance with the ëRidley Rulesí, which can only be applied after it is clear that no UK institution is able to raise sufficient funds to acquire a work. The Ridley Rules then allow for offers from private individuals, who will guarantee public access to the painting for 100 days within a 12-month period.
In the first phase of this arrangement, the painting will be on display at the National Gallery from 10 May 2010 for a period of 18 months.
National Gallery Director, Dr Nicholas Penny, said: "I want first of all to pay tribute to the private collector who has had the imagination and confidence to take this step. I hope that their example will be followed. They have acted in exactly the way that the Reviewing Committee has hoped.
Visit The National Gallery in London at : http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/
