Italian Ceramics: Catalogue of the J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

3 3 c Design depicting the Getty plate with grotesques, Cantagalli manufac­

tory Florence, late nineteenth century. Watercolor, 52.5 x 57 cm

(20/ 4 x 22 VA in.). Faenza, Fondo Cantagalli. Even in the late 1800s the

Getty plate was still being used as a workshop pattern for Cantagalli

ceramics, an indication of the high esteem in which it was held.

edge and the way in which the grotesque figure on the

right gracefully crosses his left hand over his right arm,

throwing a shadow on his extended forearm. The type of

grotesques on the present plate might instead have been

inspired by prints of contemporary ornament, such as

those executed by the engravers Agostino Musi (called

Agostino Veneziano; ca. 1490-ca. 1540),^15 Giovanni An­

tonio da Brescia (active ca. 1490-after 1525), or Marcan­

tonio Raimondi (ca. 1480-1534) (fig. 33B).

Notes

1. As cited in Marryat 1857, 34; Fortnum 1873, 596.


2. S.P. Q.R. [Senatus populusque romanus) does not indicate specific
   Roman patronage but, rather, serves a decorative and generalized sym­
   bolic function, since it commonly appears on maiolica wares, most of­
   ten with trophy motifs, from pottery centers throughout Italy.


3. Timothy Wilson in National Gallery 1993, 136-37; Ravanelli Guidotti
   1990 , 210-n, 230, no. 116. These bowls belong to a group of roughly
   ten similarly painted examples (listed in National Gallery 1993); they
   are among the finest of the group and are, therefore, more closely com­
   parable to the later, extraordinary Venetian plate.


4. For examples of comparable decoration on works believed to be from
   Castel Durante see Giacomotti 1974, nos. 747-72; Chompret 1949, 2:
   figs. 65-101; Ballardini 1933, 1: pi. 28, figs. 213, 217-20, 223; Rackham
   1940 , 1: no. 615; 2: pi. 97; Corradi 1982, no. 50; della Chiara 1979,
   nos. 83, 85. One finds similarly mannered grotesque decoration on the
   rim of a plate of uncertain origin in the Victoria and Albert Museum,
   London, which according to Rackham, "points to Castel Durante"
   (Rackham 1940, 1: no. 994), as well as around the rim of a large plate
   of about the mid-sixteenth century in the Museo Civico, Pesaro, also
   attributed to Castel Durante (della Chiara 1979, no. 79).


5. Mallet 1996, 230, no. 14; Falke 1917, no. 1.


6. "Grotesque painting ... is very refined; I don't know where its use origi­
   nates. It costs two florins per hundred in the State of Urbino and, in
   Venice, it costs eight" (Lightbown and Caiger-Smith 1980, 1: folio 67
   recto; 2: 113).


7. See, for example, Rackham 1940, 2: nos. 535-37, pi. 84.


8. For Venetian plates that are similar in shape and decoration see Alvera
   Bortolotto 1981, pis. 36c-d, 43a, 46a, 48a-e, 51, 55a; Alvera Bortolotto
   1980 , 154, figs. 1-2; Wilson 1987B, pis. 3-8. For a discussion of Venet­
   ian wares with berettino glaze and alia porcellana motifs see ibid. [Wil­
   son 1987B ?], 63-66; Alvera Bortolotto 1983, 310-12, pis. 82-85;
   Wilson 1987A, 184-89.


9. Sale cat., Christie's, London, October 3, 1983, lot 215; Alvera Bortolotto
   1988 , 43 (identified as in a private Venetian collection); sale cat.,
   Sotheby's, March 22, 1977, lot 51, dated 1544; a fourth example is in a
   private Italian collection, perhaps made in the workshop of Jacomo da
   Pesaro (Wilson 1996, 424-26, no. 164).


10. Wilson 1996, 424-26, no. 164.


11. In general maiolica designs were somewhat old-fashioned in relation to
    contemporary oil and fresco painting; for example, the depiction of
    three-dimensional space in maiolica painting was only attempted about
    1500, two centuries after Giotto and nearly a century after Alberti's per­
    spective studies. Ceramic artists were apparently fully occupied with
    mastering the new and difficult techniques of maiolica production—
    including the particularly demanding tasks of glaze manufacture, paint­
    ing, and firing—and were less concerned with rivaling the stylistic in­
    novations of other art forms.


12. The painting style, however, differs significantly from any of the artist's
    known maiolica designs. For a discussion of Battista Franco and
    maiolica see Fagiolo 1981, 245-48; Clifford and Mallet 1976, 387-410.
    For an examination of Taddeo Zuccaro's maiolica designs see Gere 1963,
    306-15; Laskin 1978, 2: 281-84, pis. 1-2; Watson 1987, 177-82.


13. Marryat 1857, 34, fig. 18.


14. See, for example, the nude man seen from the rear on the left-hand side
    of Zuccaro's design for Banquet in a Piazza (Laskin 1978: pi. 1).


15. Oberhuber 1978, 27: nos. 564-II [396], 579-II [399].

Plate with Grotesques 185