January 2009

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Drawings after Correggio by Annibale Carracci and Pietro Faccini
To turn now to the Emilian schools, two small red chalk drawings of disparate quality bearing an attribution to ‘Pietro Faccini (?)’ deserve a more prominent reassessment in the literature.39 These sheets were mentioned early on, by Giovanni Morelli in 1893, and A. E. Popham in 1957, in discarding attributions to Correggio, but seem now forgotten.40 The more vigorously drawn though damaged figure study of a young boy in red chalk (Fig. 14) represents a free copy in reverse of the putto at lower centre in Correggio’s Madonna of St George (Gemäldegalerie, Dresden), of c. 1530-32. However, the design in this Dresden sheet faces in the same direction as the more mature putto at left in Annibale’s own Judgement of Paris composition, which is recorded in an oil sketch on paper (Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Mass., 1932. 333), whose attribution is debated between Annibale and Pietro Faccini.41 According to Carlo Cesare Malvasia’s Felsina pittrice (1678), Faccini trained in the Carracci academy until about 1594, when his jealousy of Annibale caused a rift, leading Faccini to open his own art academy in Bologna.42 The attribution to Faccini of the Fogg oil sketch seems the more tenable, given the figural types and rather open, unsculptural conception of forms.43 A comprehensive copy in paint on paper after Correggio’s Madonna of St George, reasonably attributed to the young Annibale himself, was recently identified, and this also encompasses the motif of the putti which inspired the Dresden sheet.

Long inaccessible, the Dresden sheet exhibits irregularly cropped borders, measuring 23.6 x 9.3 cm (maximum), and although the drawing surface is very abraded in parts, the quality of execution is without doubt high, indicating, at least to my eye, the authorship of the young Annibale, as it seems fully comparable to that of the finer copies in red chalk of c. 1580-85 after Correggio’s paintings by Annibale that are famous in the literature.45 In the drawn copies after Correggio of c. 1580-85 accepted to be by the young Annibale, the handling of the red chalk is firm in the contours, and the modelling exhibits a luminous, but assured, deeply sculptural quality, while observing a remarkable fidelity to the overall style of Correggio.

Yet further drawings associable with Annibale copying Correggio after this particular putto’s figure in the Dresden sheet exist – a sheet of damaged surface and of apparently inferior quality (E.B. Crocker Art Gallery, Sacramento),46 and a further companion sheet at Dresden (Figs. 12 and 13). However, in the case of both of these drawings one is inclined to reject an attribution to Annibale himself.47 The sheet in Dresden is double-sided and the recto (Fig. 13) offers a nearly exact companion drawing to the sheet just discussed (Fig. 14), but includes two putti rather than one, as in Correggio’s Madonna of St Jerome. The recto drawing at Dresden is very evidently not by the same draftsman as that of no. C369, being much weaker, flatter, and diluted in design. This qualitative difference of authorship between the two Dresden sheets was emphasised by A. E. Popham in 1957.

The verso of no. C368 (Fig. 12), however, offers quick, spirited sketches of three boys, again derived from Correggio’s Madonna of St Jerome, and the quality of this drawing is higher than that on the recto. An attribution of both sides of this latter Dresden sheet to Pietro Faccini is most probable (as is traditionally maintained at the Kupferstich-Kabinett Dresden), given the boys’ exaggerated expression, rather pointy facial features, devilish grins, bodies articulated with bold, open contours, as well as the expansive, almost flaccid handling of the red chalk. These motifs may also be compared to Faccini’s Mystical Marriage of St Catherine (Pinacoteca Nazionale inv. 58, on deposit at Palazzo Pepoli Campogrande, Bologna), done about 1587-88 and an altarpiece first praised in Francesco Scanelli’s Il Microcosmo della pittura (1657), for its imitation of Correggio’s taste with regard to the playing putti in the foreground.49

Although the emerging nucleus of Carraccesque copies after Correggio offers thorny problems of authorship, the copies help demonstrate the deeply didactic context contained in the Carracci’s brilliant responses to Correggio, around 1580-85: ‘alle divine [opere] del Coreggio tutto dedicossi,’ exclaimed Malvasia of Lodovico’s emulation,50 and Annibale’s biographer stressed his trips to Parma for his first-hand study of the master.51 Not only was the impact of Correggio on Lodovico and Annibale Carracci long-lasting,52 but it also helped define the training ground for artists in their circle, such as Pietro Faccini.