This winter and spring Parmigianino’s hauntingly beautiful portrait of a young woman known as Antea (c.1531–34) will be on view in the United States for the first time in more than twenty years. Generously lent to The Frick Collection by the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples, this painting is one of the most important portraits of the Italian Renaissance.
Like Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Parmigianino’s Antea is a consummate example of a portrait with compelling psychological presence. The sitter’s penetrating gaze and naturalistic presentation suggest that we may be encountering a real person, yet the identity of this young woman is unknown. Many questions about the painting remain unanswered. Of these, the most persistent concerns the sitter’s identity. One of the earliest mentions of the painting, dating from the late seventeenth century, claims she is Antea, a famous Roman courtesan, and Parmigianino’s mistress; other theories suggest she is the daughter or servant of the artist, a noble bride, or a member of an aristocratic family.
This single-painting presentation will offer an opportunity to explore the many proposals put forward regarding this issue, based on a close analysis of her costume and jewelry and a study of the painting’s provenance, as well as the chance to consider the work within its original social and cultural context. It will be accompanied by three public lectures and a fully illustrated catalogue written by Andrew W. Mellon Fellow Christina Neilson. Presentation at The Frick Collection of Parmigianino’s Antea: A Beautiful Artifice is organized with the Foundation for Italian Art & Culture. The exhibition is made possible through the generosity of the Alexander Bodini Foundation. Corporate support has been provided by Fiduciary Trust Company International. Additional support has been provided by Aso O. Tavitian and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Comments Colin B. Bailey, Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator, “We are delighted to present Parmigianino’s Antea, an exhibition that would not have been possible without the generosity of the Museo di Capodimonte and the assistance of the Foundation for Italian Art & Culture. One of the most beloved and mysterious of all Italian Renaissance portraits, Antea has captivated those who have confronted the work for centuries. With its very special, temporary display in New York this season, as well as through a stimulating group of lectures and a freshly researched publication, the beautiful, unknown sitter will undoubtedly find yet more admirers.”
PARMIGIANINO: PAINTER OF DOZENS OF PORTRAITS
The events of Parmigianino’s life provide a broad context for the painting’s conception and meaning. Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, known as Parmigianino, was born in Parma in 1503 into a family of painters. In 1524 the gifted young artist traveled to Rome, where he was instantly regarded as “Raphael revived,” owing to his imitation of Raphael’s painting style and his own elegant demeanor. His success in the Eternal City was cut short by the Sack of Rome in 1527.
He fled to Bologna and later returned home to Parma in 1530, probably at the invitation of the confraternity of Santa Maria della Steccata, which commissioned him to paint frescoes in the church’s apse, a prestigious assignment. Though the project consumed Parmigianino for the next nine years, he never completed it. His slow progress so angered the confraternity it dismissed him in 1539 and had him thrown in jail. Following his release, he fled to nearby Casalmaggiore, where he died of fever in 1540 at the age of thirty-seven. Throughout his brief, peripatetic career, Parmigianino painted dozens of portraits. Most were of illustrious men, and a small number, including the Antea, were of beautiful women.
During his final years in Parma (1530–39), Parmigianino’s most significant private patrons were members of the noble Baiardi family, who protected and befriended him. Elena Baiardi commissioned Parmigianino’s Madonna of the Long Neck, arguably the artist’s best-known painting today. Her brother Francesco is mentioned in early sources as Parmigianino’s “very good friend,” and he provided financial support for the artist during his troubled dealings with the Steccata. An inventory of Francesco’s possessions—generally dated to 1561, the year of his death—indicates that he owned twenty-two paintings and more than five hundred drawings by Parmigianino, many inherited upon the artist’s death. The Antea is among the works listed, but it is not known if Baiardi commissioned the portrait.
ANTEA: COMPELLINGLY REAL, YET STILL UNIDENTIFIED
Parmigianino depicted Antea standing, gazing out at the viewer with surprising frankness. Her perfect oval face is set on an improbably ample body with wide shoulders and hips. The gold satin dress she wears is embellished with silver bands, while her apron and the cuffs of her underdress are decorated with delicate blackwork embroidery. Rubies and pearls further enhance her sumptuous costume, as does the marten fur draped over her shoulder. The painting contains areas of crystalline detail, such as the shiny enamel links in the gold chain hanging from her shoulders and the light reflecting off the black ribbon entwined in her hair. The almost full-length, frontal standing format, unprecedented in Renaissance female portraiture, evokes the possibility of movement. The gown, billowing gently at the left, suggests that she has turned to face the viewer. Antea’s penetrating gaze further conveys the impression that the woman depicted before us is a living, sentient being. Using these contrivances, Parmigianino has created a convincing image of an individual who is compellingly real.
The Antea’s naturalistic execution and intricate detail have been compared to the works Parmigianino executed some time between 1534 and 1539 (including his Madonna of the Long Neck). This has led most art historians to propose a similar dating for the portrait. An overlooked drawing, however, suggests that Antea may have been completed by about 1534. The preliminary chalk study of Antea’s left hand, which captures the general position of her fingers and flexed thumb, lies beneath a pen-and-ink sketch of a putto. This figure, with minor variations, appears in Parmigianino’s unfinished painting Saturn and Philyra (private collection), executed about 1534. As the putto was drawn over the study for Antea’s hand, the sketch of the hand must predate 1534 and, thus, the finished portrait may as well. -- www.frick.org
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