Lot 151
Property from a Private American Collection
Antonio Joli
Modena 1700 - 1777 Napoli
Architectural capriccio with Christ's miraculous healing of a paralytic man at Bethesda
oil on canvas
canvas: 49⅛ by 40⅛ in.; 124.8 by 101.9 cm.
framed: 55¾ by 45⅞ in.; 141.6 by 116.5 cm.
Condition Report
Provenance
John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (1713-1792), Highcliffe, Hampshire;1
His posthumous sale, London, Christie's, 19 March 1796, lot 70 (with a pendant, as by P. Panini);
Where acquired by Gerard Levinge van Heythuysen (circa 1751-1797), London and Bristol;
Thence by gift and then descent to Mrs. Stone Rigg;
From whom acquired by Arthur Tooth and Sons, London, 1928;
From whom acquired by Hon. M.A. Borthwick;
Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, 14 April 1978, lot 91 (with a pendant, as by Panini);
Anonymous sale ("The Property of a Gentleman"), London, Sotheby's, 9 July 1998, lot 109 (as by Joli);
Where acquired by the present collector.
Literature
F. Arisi, Gian Paolo Panini e i fasti della Roma del '700, Rome 1986, p. 273, cat. no. 104, reproduced (as a work by the young Panini, circa 1720);
R. Toledano, Antonio Joli, Turin 2006, pp. 104-105, cat. no. C.XIV.1, reproduced;
G. Sestieri, Il Capriccio architettonico in Italia nel XVII e XVIII secolo, Rome 2015, vol. II, p. 235, cat. no. 6.1a, reproduced in color p. 234 (as attributed to Joli, with figures by Gaspare Diziani).
Catalogue note
This grand architectural capriccio, which Joli produced early in his career, forms an elaborate backdrop before which the miraculous New Testament episode of Christ healing a paralyzed man at the baths of Bethesda transpires. Joli combines the real and fantastical and the antique and Baroque in his theatrical scene, the type of image especially popular with Grand Tourists in the eighteenth century. An angled arcade frames a series of overlapping concentric porticoes. The complex structures, whose soaring vaults are deftly articulated by variegated marbles, are surmounted by partly-crumbling obelisks.
Though born in Modena, Joli spent his formative years in Rome, where he worked in the studios of both Giovanni Paolo Panini (to whom this painting was formerly attributed) and the Galli-Bibiena family. This work, executed soon after Joli’s arrival in Rome, circa 1720, demonstrates the influence of both on the young artist. The theatrical nature of the painting’s illusionistic setting derives from Panini, while the composition’s construction suggests Joli's familiarity with the Bibiena’s invention of the scena per angolo, or scene viewed from an angle, in which perspectival schema are created through the use of multiple vanishing points. Meanwhile the fluid execution recalls Sebastiano Ricci and the lively palette evokes Gaspare Diziani.
Originally conceived as part of a pair, this composition was coupled with a depiction of the Massacre of the Innocents.2 Autograph replicas of the two, executed by Joli in collaboration with Diziani, were sold at Sotheby’s, London (5 July 2005, lot 44).
We are grateful to Dr. Ralph Toledano for reconfirming the attribution of the present lot.
1 Stuart may have acquired the painting in February or March of 1769, when he was in Naples.
2 Private collection; sold Sotheby's, London, 17 April 1996, lot 13.