A LARGE PHARMACY JAR (ALBARELLO), VENICE, MASTRO DOMENICO (ATTR.), CIRCA 1560-1570 LARGE ALBARELLO, VENICE, MASTRO DOMENICO (ATTR.), CIRCA 1560-1570 majolica painted in polychrome in blue, yellow, orange yellow, copper green, tin white and brown in violet and manganese black in several colour tones. On the bottom, label of provenance Alberto and Michele SUBERT - MILANO ; h. cm 36.8, diam. of mouth cm 20.2, diam. of foot cm 23.6 Comparative literature J. Lessmann, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum Braunschweig. Italienische Majolika. Katalog der Sammlung, Brunswick 1979, pp. 409, 460-461; G. Canelli, Maioliche veneziane del Cinquecento da collezioni private , exhibition cat., Milan 1990, no. 16; F. Saccardo in R. Ausenda (ed.), La collezione della Fondazione Banco di Sicilia. Le maioliche, Cinisello Balsamo 2010, pp.156-159 no. 55; R. Perale, Maioliche da farmacia nella Serenissima, Venice 2021, pp. 107-119 and in particular p. 135 and related bibliography The large albarello has a cylindrical body, tapering downwards, with a strongly rounded shoulder and foot divided by a clear demarcation underlined by a raised fillet; the cylindrical neck is low, terminating in a barely everted rim. The decoration, which covers the entire surface, features a tall rectangular cartouche in the centre of the front, enclosed in a complex frame, at the centre of which is the Gothic inscription Mostarda.f, surmounted by an oval medallion with a bearded male portrait, facing left and with his head covered by a purplish-brown sack cap. Under the cartouche is a male face painted in the guise of a mask, while on the sides two splendid figures of mermaids, skilfully outlined, stand out against the background woven with the characteristic stetched motif of leafy whorls, small fruits, acanthus leaves and small multi-petalled corollas on a cobalt blue background decorated with sgraffio. On the opposite face, within a robbiana frame made in an unusual version with pointed blue leaves tied by a thin ribbon accompanied by small rounded fruits and centred by open corollas, stands the figure of a condottiere with a lorica and head adorned with a feathered helmet, set against a deep yellow background. A portrait with a similar setting is found in a bowl from the workshop of Mastro Domenico exhibited in the Canelli Gallery exhibition in 1990 (no. 16), but the figure of our albarello reflects the quick, dry handwriting associated with the workshop master's hand. A portrait of a bearded man in a specimen in the collection of the Cini Foundation in Venice is a stylistic example in the way this type of portraiture is depicted, and the quality is undoubtedly the same as that of the portraits in a splendid boccia from the Perez collection in Palermo. However, it is in the mermaid figures and in certain details, which bear witness to a skilful mastery of painting, that we seem to recognise the possible work of the master, or in any case of a painter of high hand, in the realisation of the work. This is especially true of Mastro Domenico's historiated plates, three of which in the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum in Braunschweig, Hamburg, bear his autograph signature. In this case, the very high quality of the work and the morphological and decorative realisation suggest an important patronage.