Saint Christopher
Saint Christopher
- Artist
- Vincenzo Foppa
- Artist Dates
- c. 1430-1515/1516
- Artist Nationality
- Italian
- Title
- Saint Christopher
- Date
- about 1460
- Medium
- tempera and gold on panel
- Dimensions
- 58.8 x 37 cm (23-1/8 x 14-5/8 in)
- K Number
- K493
- Repository
- Denver Art Museum
- Accession Number
- 1961.160
- Notes
Provenance
(Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi [1878-1955] Rome-Florence); sold to Samuel H. Kress [1863-1955] on 18 June 1937; gift 1939 to the National Gallery of Art; deaccessioned in 1952 and returned to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation; gift to Denver Art Museum, no. 1961.160.
Catalogue Entry
Vincenzo Foppa
Saint Christopher
K493
Denver, Colo., Denver Art Museum (E-IT-I8-XV-931), since 1954.(1) Wood. 23 1/8 X 14 5/8 in. (59 X 37.4 cm.). Fair condition; some restorations; gold background abraded; cleaned 1954. Although there has been some difference of opinion as to its date, K493, a panel from a dismembered polyptych, is fully accepted as one of Foppa's most expressive paintings.(2) A date of about 1470 seems plausible. The fervent, upturned face of the saint may have been inspired by Bellini's St. Christopher in an altarpiece in Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice. The influence of K493 on Foppa's followers seems to have been even more pronounced.(3) Provenance: Contini Bonacossi, Florence. Kress acquisition, 1937 – exhibited: 'La Pittura Bresciana del Rinascimento,' Palazzo Tosio-Martinengo, Brescia, May-Sept., 1939, p. 70, no. 29 of catalogue by F. Lechi, as Foppa; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (386), 1941-51;(4) after entering the Denver Art Museum: 'Arte Lombarda dai Visconti agli Sforza,' Palazzo Reale, Milan, Apr.-June, 1955, p. 100, no. 304 of catalogue, as Foppa.
References
(1) Catalogue by W. E. Suida, 1954, p. 22, as Foppa. (2) B. Berenson, G. Fiocco, R. Longhi, F. M. Perkins, A. Venturi (in ms. opinions), A. Morassi (in Emporium, vol. LXXXIX, 1939, p. 358, dating it very early, not later than 1460), F. Wittgens (Vincenzo Foppa, n.d. [1948?], pp. 62 f, 98, calling it one of the master's most intense paintings and dating it about 1470), E. Sandberg-Vavalà (in Burlington Magazine, vol. XCIII, 1951, p. 135), and C. Baroni and S. Samek Ludovici (La Pittura lombarda del quattrocento, 1952, pp. 150 f, dating it a little after 1460) attribute K493 to Foppa. (3) See Wittgens, loc. cit. in note 2, above, for examples of the influence. (4) Preliminary Catalogue, 1941, p. 66, as Foppa.