;17 A Fortified Port
Pen and brown ink; H: 29 cm (n^7 /i6 in.); W: 43.2 cm
(17 in.)
85.GA.4o 8
MARKS AND INSCRIPTIONS: None.
PROVENANCE: Art market, Amsterdam; sale, Sotheby's,
London, March 23, 1972, lot 121; art market, New York.
EXHIBITIONS: None.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: P. Bagni, // Guercino e il suo falsario—
Idisegni dipaesaggio (Bologna, 1985), p. 36, no. 18.THIS IS ONE OF MANY LANDSCAPE DRAWINGS BY
Guercino that seem to have been made for their own
sake.^1 The location depicted here appears to be imaginary.
The selection of a port is relatively uncommon in the art-
ist's landscape drawings, though large circular towers
occur elsewhere.^2 In its planar clarity and emphasis on ar-
chitectonic form, this drawing may be compared with
two others in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York
(inv. iv, 168, i,ioo).^3 The Museum's sheet would seem
to date from after 1630, as has been suggested by D.
DeGrazia and N. Turner.^41. For Guercino's landscapes, see D. Mahon, // Guercino, Diseg-
m, exh. cat., Palazzo dellArchiginnasio, Bologna, 1968, pp.
178-200.
2. Forexample, in one of his drawings at Chats worth (inv. 533
ibid., no. 208).
3. Mahon 1968 (note i), nos. 212, 211.- Conversations with the author, 1985.
54 ITALIAN SCHOOL • GUERCINO