A case of mistaken identity

Now you see her, now you don't





This art story about the reattribution of a painting is not a whodunit but a who was it.

In 1902, the American railway tycoon and prodigious art collector Henry Walters (right) bought an old master painting, a  1539 portrait of the Renaissance poet Vittoria Colonna;.a fine boned, pale woman dressed in black.   Walters painting was said to be by Jacopo Pontormo and that attribution has remained uncontested. What has changed is the the identification of its subject--or subjects as it has turned out. Walters who died in 1931, left his collection and the mansions that housed it to the city of Baltimore. In the late nineteen thirties, the Walters Art Museum gave the Pontormo a good cleaning. In the process a child appeared in the foreground and it was possible to get a much better look at the adult, too. (Below)





 The grown up was quickly reidentified as Maria Salviati a noblewoman of whom there were many portraits .Widowed at 27, she never remarried and for the rest of her life she remained in mourning dressing like a nun. (Indeed that is how Pontormo painted her in 1540,right.) As for the child: It was immediately assumed that he was her only son Cosimo de'Medici (below) who grew up to be the powerful Duke of Florence. More than sixty years passed before the little boy, finally, was seen to be a little girl. (Another round of applause for the role of the woman's movement in restoring 20-20 vision to those who, if the facts were blurry but the subject was powerful always saw a man--or in this case a boy.)

   That little girl has now been identified as Giulia de'Medici. Here come a small sample of the Byzantine carrying on in Tuscany at this time. Alessandro was the first Medici Duke of Florence but not for long. He was assassinated in 1537-- just two years before Pontormo painted the double portrait of his daughter with her aunt. By the time painting, Maria was the child's guardian.  It just could be that Maria Salviati commissioned the double portrait which shows them hand in hand to counter the gossips that Cosimo was responsible for Alessandro's murder.

   Alessandro (right) was the illegitimate son of a Cardinal and his African servant. His daughter, too, was of mixed race.(Her portrait as a young adult appears at the top of this post. It, and the portraits of her father and uncle were painted by Agnolo Bronzino.) The research that made it possible to identify Giulia in the painting bought by HenryWalters more than a century ago inspired the terrific and illuminating exhibition "Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe." For that we can thank Joaneath Spicer curator of Renaissance and Baroque Art at the Walters where the show originated. It is now at the Princeton University Museum of Art. Catch it if you can. And read about it in my Economist for sure!

                   

. “I wanted to think about the people themselves,” says Ms. Spicer, explaining the purpose of the show. “Once you take that perspective, you generate new information.” You also reveal facts that aren't new but seem to have been painted over, just as little Giulia once was .The most amazing of those facts is this:  During the era covered by the exhibition, “the long sixteenth century, 1480-1610),  African slaves brought to Europe then were NOT enslaved for life.  Read Jose Saramago's novel, Baltasar and Blimunda for an idea of what happened to many right after they were freed. It takes place in Lisbon where at this time ten percent of the population was African. Yes, really.