Old Woman with Pestle and Mortar
possibly Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri (1589 - c.1657)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1620
Materials
Oil on canvas (circular)
Measurements
685 mm (27 in) (Diameter)
Place of origin
Italy
Order this imageCollection
Stourhead, Wiltshire
NT 732309
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Old Woman with Pestle and Mortar, Italian School, possibly Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri (1589- Rome 1657), early 17th century. A circular painting in a square frame of a crone viewed at half length and turned towards the left stands beside a table on which there is a large mortar filled with a green mash. The woman is possibly making either pesto or salsa verde. She holds a pestle in her right hand and is either about to or has already tasted some of the mash which is on the forefinger of her left hand. She looks out at the spectator, her head cocked slightly towards the left. The woman wears a brown dress with a white lining and lace around the neckline. Her skirt or apron is blue. Some white cloth is bound around her hair.
Full description
Representations of individuals eating and drinking originate with Caravaggio’s close follower Bartolomeo Manfredi and his non-Italian counterparts, such as Valentin de Boulogne and Hendrick ter Brugghen. As the popularity of these paintings grew among collectors, so too did the genre develop, with figures often taking on allegorical meanings. In this picture, the old woman smelling or tasting the green paste she has ground – probably pesto or ‘salsa verde’ – may refer to one or other sense. She looks out and ‘converses’ with the viewer, a motif ultimately derived from Caravaggio’s early picture of youths, which continued to have a profound effect on genre paintings in Rome well into the second decade of the seventeenth century. The Caravaggio scholar Benedict Nicolson (1914-1978) assigned this work to an unidentified north Netherlandish artist (possibly from Utrecht) working in Rome about 1620, whom he associated with Theodoor Rombouts and Jean Ducamps, and nicknamed Caravaggesque Master ‘G’. However, ‘A Woman with a Pestle and Mortar’ is by an Italian follower of Caravaggio and has been convincingly ascribed to Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri The early history of the painting is unknown. The fact that it isn’t listed in the Stourhead inventories or mentioned by Horace Walpole after his visit in 1762, would suggest that this picture, along with ‘A Man with a Wine Flask’ (NT 732310) also by a follower of Caravaggio, was unlikely to have been acquired by Henry Hoare II (1705-1785). These two pictures may have been purchased to fill some of the gaps left by the 1883 Heirloom sales, a series of painting, furniture and book auctions forced upon the estate by the flamboyant lifestyle of Sir Henry Ainslie Hoare (1824-1894). Following his departure from Stourhead in 1885, he was succeeded by his cousin Sir Henry Hoare, who moved there with his wife Alda from Wavendon in Buckinghamshire. They may well have brought the paintings with them, or purchased them slightly later, as the frames would also suggest. Although framed identically and hung together as pendants, ‘A Woman with a Pestle and Mortar’ is almost certainly not the pair of ‘A Man with a Wine Flask’. They are clearly by different artists; one of them most likely Dutch, the other Italian. The paintings do not relate compositionally to each other, with their figures facing the same way, and the two protagonists also differ in scale: the old woman in this work is shown to the waist, and so is proportionally smaller than her male companion portrayed in bust-length. Furthermore, the canvas weave in both paintings runs diagonally, suggesting that they are fragments cut down from larger compositions: ‘A Woman with a Pestle and Mortar,’ in particular, appears tilted, the table-top on which the mortar sits running at an improbable angle. The paintings’ matching gilt plaster frames are from the early nineteenth century, thereby implying this as the most likely dates for the works to have been acquired and ‘made up’ as a false pair. Text adapted from Letizia Treves, Beyond Caravaggio, exh. cat. 2016
Provenance
Possibly in the collection of Giovan Battista Mellini (1591-1627) in Rome in 1627 but not of his descendents; not mentioned in Stourhead inventories, nor by Horace Walpole after his visit in 1762, and therefore unlikely to have been acquired by Henry Hoare II (1705-1785); introduced (possibly from Wavendon in Buckinghamshire) between 1913-25; given to the National Trust along with the house, its grounds, and the rest of contents by Sir Henry Hugh Arthur Hoare, 6th Bt (1865-1947) in 1946.
Credit line
Stourhead, The Hoare Collection (National Trust)
Makers and roles
possibly Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri (1589 - c.1657), photographer Italian School, artist previously catalogued as possibly Angelo Caroselli (1585 - 1682), artist Caravaggesque (Italian) School , artist
Exhibition history
Beyond Caravaggio, National Gallery, London, 2016 - 2017 Beyond Caravaggio, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, 2016 - 2017 Beyond Caravaggio, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, 2016 - 2017
References
Nicolson 1975 Benedict Nicolson, 'Caravaggesque Pictures in National Trust Houses', National Trust Year Book, 1975-76, pp.4-6, repd. plates 6, 7 Nicolson 1979 Benedict Nicolson,The International Caravaggesque Movement: List of Pictures by Caravaggio and his Followers throughout Europe from 1590 to 1650, 1979, p.36 Beyond Caravaggio (by Letizia Treves), The National Gallery, London: 12 October 2016- 15 January 2017; National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, 11 February - 14 May 2017; Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh, 17 June - 24 September 2017, cat.40, pp.148-149 Pulini 2005 M. Pulini, 'Il Fossombrone ritrattista degli oratoriani. La raccolta Mattei e Antiveduto Gramatica', Paragone, LVI, 60, 2005, pp. 301-24