Portrait of Michelangelo
| Reference: | S32757 |
| Author | Giulio BONASONE |
| Year: | 1546 |
| Measures: | 177 x 230 mm |
| Reference: | S32757 |
| Author | Giulio BONASONE |
| Year: | 1546 |
| Measures: | 177 x 230 mm |
Description
Engraving, 1546, lettered with five lines of Latin text 'Michael Angelvs ... / MDXLVI' and in lower right 'IVLIO.B.F.'
Good example printed on contemporary laid paper, trimmed to the borlderline, very good condition.
Bonasone’s engraving depicts Michelangelo, facing right set within a cartouche, at the age of approximately seventytwo, soon to be named chief architect of St. Peter, 1 January 1547. Most probably after the print by Enea Vico, dated 1545.
The portrait was put to use seven year later as frontispiece in Ascanio Condivi’s Vita.
The inscription reads “How much art can do in nature and nature in art, this one who equal in art to nature teaches”.
The same profile likeness was engraved in 1545, by an anonymous engraver. The attribution to Vico, proposed by Rudolph Weigel (Kunstlager Catalog, 1840, p. 49, n. 98) followed then by Nagel, is accepted also by Stefania Massari.
Obheruher has noted the existence of a first state "ante litteram", undescribed, at the British Museum
Literature
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Bartsch XV.170.345; Massari 1983 85°; Obheruber (1966), p. 185 n. 312.
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Giulio BONASONE (Bologna circa 1500 - Roma circa 1580)
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Giulio Bonasone was born in Bologna in 1510; he was engraver, etcher and, as a painter, he was a pupil of Lorenzo Sabbatici.
The critics have ascribed to him 400 prints; nearly all of them are kept nowadays in the Institute of Graphic Design in Rome, widening the list of Bartsch, who had identified just 354 subjects. Bonasone started working in 1531 as copperplate engraver, as it can be seen from his S. Cecilia, and he was considered a follower of Marcantonio’s style in the last years. But Bonasone showed his own style quite soon, for Parmigianino asked him to engrave many of his works.
He lived in Rome between 1544 and 1547, working for the most important publishers of the time (Salamanca, Barlacchi, Lafrery), engraving subjects from Michelangelo, Raphael, Giulio Romano, Perin del Vaga and Polidoro da Caravaggio with his peculiar style.
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Literature
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Bartsch XV.170.345; Massari 1983 85°; Obheruber (1966), p. 185 n. 312.
|
Giulio BONASONE (Bologna circa 1500 - Roma circa 1580)
|
Giulio Bonasone was born in Bologna in 1510; he was engraver, etcher and, as a painter, he was a pupil of Lorenzo Sabbatici.
The critics have ascribed to him 400 prints; nearly all of them are kept nowadays in the Institute of Graphic Design in Rome, widening the list of Bartsch, who had identified just 354 subjects. Bonasone started working in 1531 as copperplate engraver, as it can be seen from his S. Cecilia, and he was considered a follower of Marcantonio’s style in the last years. But Bonasone showed his own style quite soon, for Parmigianino asked him to engrave many of his works.
He lived in Rome between 1544 and 1547, working for the most important publishers of the time (Salamanca, Barlacchi, Lafrery), engraving subjects from Michelangelo, Raphael, Giulio Romano, Perin del Vaga and Polidoro da Caravaggio with his peculiar style.
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