Carlo Saraceni (1579 - 1620) and workshop "Madonna with Child, St. Anne and Angel", also called "Madonna of Sleep" or "An Angel watches over the Child Jesus with the Virgin and St. Elizabeth", 1610-1615 Oil on canvas 89.5 x 125 cm Distinctive elements: on the frame on the reverse, in black felt-tip pen, "LK1516"; on the upper axis of the frame, in black felt-tip pen, "LI"; on the lower axis, typed label, applied with three pins ""MADONNA WITH CHILD, S. GIOVANNINO AND S. ANNA" by Saraceni. (Purchased at auction at the Galleria IL PRATO in Florence on 20/11/70 for £.507.060)". Provenance: Giovan Angelo Altemps (1587-1620; inv. 1618-1619, "a large painting" by "Carlo Venetiano" showing "the Madonna, St. Elizabeth and Our Lord with an angel"); Galleria Il Prato, Florence, 20.11.1970; Koelliker Collection (November 2002) Bibliography: G. Papi, card in, G. Papi, ed., "La "schola" del Caravaggio. Dipinti della Collezione Koelliker", exhibition catalogue, edited by G. Papi, Milan 2006, pp. 106-107, cat. 25 (Saraceni); S. Benedetti," The 'schola' of Caravaggio. Ariccia," The Burlington Magazine, CIL, Feb. 2007, p. 129 (Saraceni and workshop); Y. Primarosa, 'The rediscovered original. Carlo Saraceni and the 'Angel Watching the Child Jesus with the Virgin and St. Anne' between autograph replicas, derivations and copies', in P. Di Loreto, ed., 'Originals, Replicas, Copies. Una sguardo diverso sui Grandi Maestri', Rome, 2018, pp. 174-180 (Saraceni's collaborators, on Saraceni's prototype); Y. Primarosa, "New light on Carlo Saraceni: La Madonna del Pilar di S. Maria in Monserrato and other unpublished works", in "Storia dell'Arte", Winter 2018, pp. 73-74 and 75 nn. 18-19, (Saraceni's collaborators, on Saraceni's prototype) Expositions: G. Papi, ed, "La "schola" del Caravaggio. Paintings from the Koelliker Collection", (Ariccia, Palazzo Chigi), 13 October 2006 - 11 February 2007, Ariccia, Palazzo Chigi Conservation status. Support: 80% (reintelo; reduction of a few centimetres on the left side) Conservation status. Surface: 85% (widespread paint loss, also on the faces; possibly a breakage of the canvas; paint and protective varnish, also on the head of the Child) The Venetian Carlo Saraceni (c. 1579 -1620) was one of the earliest followers of Caravaggio, to whom, to use Roberto Longhi's words, he gave a 'neo-Giorgionesque' interpretation by merging the realism of the Lombard master with tonal painting of Venetian influence. He arrived in Rome in 1598 where he frequented the workshop of the Vicentine sculptor Camillo Mariani (1567-1611) and soon moved to the service of the German painter Adam Elsheimer (1578-1610). Between 1609 and 1610 he painted the 'Transit of the Virgin', preferred by the Discalced Carmelites to Caravaggio's 'Death of the Virgin', to decorate the second chapel on the left of the Trastevere church of Santa Maria della Scala. As testified by other prestigious commissions - from the fresco decoration of the royal hall at the Quirinale to the canvases for San Lorenzo in Lucina and Santa Maria dell'Anima, to the canvas depicting 'Enrico Dandolo and the Crusader captains' for the hall of the Maggior Consiglio in the Doge's Palace in Venice - Saraceni was an exceptional painter but also a great promoter of his own work. According to a brilliant insight by Yuri Primarosa, he 'habitually executed small-format replicas of his most famous works' himself or entrusted them to his pupils, 'in his atelier in "strada Ripetta verso San Giacomo"'. "But were these 'mementos' that remained in the workshop as a memory of the most important works he had executed? Or was it a sort of showcase or sample book to be shown to potential clients who could ask the painter for more replicas of the works they had seen? With all evidence, the answer is yes to both questions. The originals, the second or third autograph versions, the four-hand paintings and the copies derived from them contributed, together with the prints, to spreading the artist's work and enhancing his reputation on a European scale' (Primarosa, 2018, 'The rediscovered original. Carlo Saraceni etc', pp. 73-74). The young scholar thus draws for Saraceni a practice common to many Veneto artists, at least from Titian to Canova (G. Tagliaferro, "The composition of themes and variations by Titian and his workshop", in P. Humfrey, ed., "Titian. Themes and Variations", Florence, 2023, pp. 12-37; P. Mariuz, "Lo studio di Canova a Roma", in G. Pavanello, ed. Eterna Bellezza", Cinisello Balsamo, 2019, pp. 44-55), which sees the author aware of the value - autonomous and persistent - of his own invention, spread through a studied system of variations and replicas: in which the manual involvement varies, but whose intellectual ownership remains indisputable and fundamental. Today, this appears to be the most up-to-date point of view from which to tackle the "comparative analysis of the numerous replicas of the Madonna del sonno [...,] a case study of great interest, as it is without doubt the most copied invention" by Carlo Saraceni (ibid., p. 74). As many as twelve works - known today - bear witness to this invention, original drafts and replicas made by Saraceni or at least under his direct control, as well as copies. Three of them - now in the Honolulu Museum of Fine Arts, the Fesh Museum and in a private collection with provenance from Giancarlo Baroni - are on copper, a technique also used in a fourth version, in Aldo Briganti's collection in 1948 and now dispersed (Letizia Treves, card 32, in Maria Giulia Aurigemma, ed. 1579-1620. Un Veneziano tra Roma e l'Europa, Rome, 2014, pp. 233-235). Eight, however, are on canvas: two linked to noble collections (Pallavicini and Altemps), two in public locations (Muzeum Narodowe in Warsaw and Badia della Trinità in Cava dei Tirreni) and two in private collections (one in Rome and the other already at auction with Samuel T. Freeman & Co, 10 July 2021, l. 91), in addition to the painting under examination, which comes from the collection of Luigi Koelliker, as Sergio Benedetti, 'without question the most ambitous and passionate collector of Italian paintings today' (Benedetti 2007, p. 127), well writes. The painting was made known by Gianni Papi in the exhibition "La "schola" del Caravaggio. Paintings from the Koelliker Collection", held at Palazzo Chigi, Ariccia, in 2006. The scholar, on account of the "sustained quality throughout the pictorial surface", considers it to be "an autograph redaction", an opinion that was reiterated most recently in a communication dated 24 October 2023. Sergio Benedetti, in his systematic review of the exhibition, completes the attributive definition by noting the intervention of the workshop ("appear to have been largely executed in Carlo Saraceni's workshop", Benedetti 2007, p. 129). Maria Giulia Aurigemma is of the same opinion, considering the work an excellent "workshop replica under the strict control and with the intervention of the Master, according to a customary practice" (communications of 2 November and 20 December 2023). (... read more: full details in the pdf catalogue at https://goforarts.com/doc/VB_IT_2_2/Meraviglie_Atto_II_HR.pdf . The catalogue also includes lots not available on online platforms, including many of the most prestigious).