Estimate

12.000 - 18.000

Session 1

13 October 2020

Hammer Price

Description

Portraits of of Twelve Caesers´s
Julius Ceaser, Augustus, Tiberius , Caligula, Claudius , Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus, Domitian
Oil on panel

39x33 cm

Category

Paintings

Additional Information

In 1536 the artist Tiziano Vecelli or Vecellio, known in English as Titian (1490-1576), was commissioned to paint 11 portraits for the "Gabinetto dei Cesari" (Caesars’s Cabinet) at Mantua’s Ducal Palace, one of the rooms designed by Giulio Romano (1499-1546) for Duke Federico II (1500-1530). These portraits were inspired by descriptions taken from the Twelve Caesars biographies written by Roman historian Suetonius (69BCE - ca.141CE).
Although the room's dimensions allowed for the placing of three large paintings on each wall, a window on the west elevation limited the series to only 11 portraits, which were completed just before the Duke’s death in August 1540. Later, the 12th portrait – Emperor Domitian – would eventually be added by Giulio Romano himself.
The 12 portraits were copied by Bernardino Campi (1522-1591) in 1561 for the Governor of Milan, Francesco Ferdinando d’Ávalos (ca.1530-1571). In approximately 1568, the painter Ippolito Andreasi (1548-1608) copied Titian 11 Caesars for Jacopo Strada (1507-1588). They would then be engraved by Aegidius Sadeler II and published in Antwerp ca. 1625. Republished by Marcus Sadeler (1614-1660) ca. 1625, the engravers had by then added the 12th portrait, as well as those of the 12 empresses, based on paintings by Giulio Romano,
In 1628 the Gonzaga art collection was sold by Duke Vincenzo II (1594-1627) to the king of England, Charles I (1600-1649). With the execution of Charles I the collection was split and auctioned by the Commonwealth of England, the paintings by Titian being eventually sold for £1.200 to the Spanish Ambassador Alonso de Cárdenas, acting agent for Luis Méndez de Haro who will offer them as a gift to King Filipe IV of Spain, III of Portugal.
The portraits were hung at Madrid’s Royal Alcazar, where they were destroyed by fire in 1734, leaving Aegidius and Marcus Sadeler prints as the sole and main record of Titian’s originals.
The 12 portraits series we are now selling were produced in the late 18th/early 19th century from those prints, hence representing an important source for the understanding of Titian’s lost works.