GIOVANNI BENEDETTO CASTIGLIONE
CIRCA 1610-1663/65
13 Pastoral Journey
Brush and brown oil paint and touches of white, blue,
and rose gouache; H: 28.1 cm (iiVie in.); W: 41.3 cm
86.GG.57 3MARKS AND INSCRIPTIONS: (Recto) at bottom right,
inscribed Benedetto in black chalk; at bottom right corner,
collection mark of Baron Dominique Vivant-Denon
(L. 779); (verso) inscribed Collection Denon in blue pencil.
PROVENANCE: Baron Dominique Vivant-Denon, Paris;
private collection, Paris; art market, Paris.
EXHIBITIONS: None.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: A. Percy, Giovanni Benedetto Castig-
lione: Master Draughtsman of the Baroque, exh. cat. (Phil-
adelphia Museum of Art, 1971), p. 94, under no. 59; E.
Schleier, in M. Kahn-Rossi et al., Pier Francesco Mola,
exh. cat. (Museo Cantonale dArte, Lugano, 1989), p.
313 , under no. IV.8.
THIS IS ONE OF SEVERAL JOURNEY SCENES BY CASTIG-
lione dating from circa 1650, including the painting in the
Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Birmingham (Percy 1971,
under no. 59). The Museum's drawing reappeared in
Paris in 1986 after having been untraced since the early
nineteenth century, when it was in the collection of
Baron Dominique Vivant-Denon. At that time it was
published in a lithographic reproduction in his Monu-
ments des arts du dessin.... l Earlier it had been copied in
prints by Charles Mace and Guillaume Chasteau.^2 The
print by Mace bears the inscription Abraham in Aegyptum
cum uxore sua ob famen peregrinatur, suggesting that the
subject of the drawing is Abraham and Sarah journeying
to Egypt to avoid the famine. The identification of the
subject on the print has considerable evidential value,
since Mace was a contemporary of Castiglione. His print
also indicates that the drawing was somewhat cropped
on all sides before Vivant-Denon owned it; it has been
reduced further by a small amount since then. The style
and technique are characteristic of Castiglione's method
of making brush drawings.1. (Paris, 1829), vol. 3, pi. 232.
2. Lettere e altri documenti intorno alia storia della pittura (Mon-
zambano, 1975), no. 49; Percy 1971.46 ITALIAN SCHOOL • CASTIGLIONE