Domenico BECCAFUMI: The Four Doctors of the Church - c. 1540
Price: € 78 000
Woodcut in chiaroscuro printed from two blocks, 175 x 220 mm (sheet). Bartsch 35, Takahatake cat. no. 68, 2nd state/2.
Impression of the second state (of 2). The first state is known only from a single impression, noted by Naoko Takahatake, in Chatsworth (The Devonshire collections). This state is characterized by the presence of parallel hatching on the calf of the figure on the right in the foreground on the line block, and by minimal differences on the tone block.
Superb impression printed in light green and black on watermarked laid paper (eight-pointed star surmounted by a crown and a flower). Impression trimmed very slightly inside the border line. A small repaired tear in the lower left-hand corner, reaching very slightly into the subject in the diagonal lines of the shadow; a 40 mm split, almost invisible on the recto, consolidated on the verso, in the vertical lines drawing the shadow in the upper left-hand corner. The impression has not been retouched.
“In the history of the Italian chiaroscuro woodcut, Domenico Beccafumi (1484/86-1551; also known as Mecarino) is unique among its practitioners for having designed and cut his own blocks.” Consequently, "Beccafumi’s prints are immediate, spirited expressions of his remarkable vision and aesthetic search." (Naoko Takahatake, p. 173). While Adam Bartsch described The Four Doctors of the Church as the work of an anonymous printmaker after a drawing by Beccafumi, the print is now widely recognized as entirely the work of the master. Naoko Takahatake has relied on stylistic and technical examination to firmly support this attribution: "there is no reason to doubt that Beccafumi was responsible for the design and cutting of both [line and tone] blocks. Indeed, the splintered, ragged edges of the lines recall the idiosyncratic cutting of his Alchemy woodcuts and watermark evidence places the print alongside such uncontested works as his large Apostoles." Beccafumi signed only one of his prints, one of the ten plates in his series on alchemy.
There are variations in the colour of the tone block from one impression to another. Some, like ours, are printed in light green and black, such as the impression in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, others in darker green and black, such as the impression in the Rijksmuseum, and still others in translucent grey and black.
Impression of the Four Doctors of the Church are very rare. We are only aware of one impression that was sold on the art market at Christie's on 10 December 2019. This impression had conservation defects, including "a skilfully repaired and made-up paper loss, circa 30 x 30 mm., at the lower left sheet corner", another of 3 mm x 3 cm in the upper left corner made up with pen and ink, as well as repaired splits in the centre (condition report, Christie's, liveauction 17352, lot 92).
The National Gallery of Art holds a preparatory drawing by Beccafumi for this print, showing two figures, including the one seen from behind in the woodcut. The subject of the print remains uncertain. Adam Bartsch identifies the four men as the four Doctors of the Church proclaimed in the 13th century by Pope Boniface VIII, but Andrea de Marchi suggests they are the four Evangelists (Beccafumi e il suo tempo, pp. 490-491).
References: Naoko Takahatake, Jonathan Bober (eds.), The chiaroscuro woodcut in Renaissance Italy, 2018.