Sulla Crocifissione appartenuta a Tommaso dei Cavalieri

The paper examines a painting entitled Crucifixion, with the Virgin and St John at the foot of the cross, kept in a private collection, conventionally attributed to the painter Marcello venusti. The painting is considered in relation to a group of Crucifixions by the same artist, held in Rome and Florence. Through historical and critical investigation and by investigating the materials, the research casts doubt on the conventional attribution to Venusti. Maria Forcellino’s paper reconstructs the history of the painting, its exportation to england from the Cavalieri collection in Rome at the end of the 18th century, up to its current ownership, on the basis of original documents from the 18th and 19th centuries. The critical background of the Crucifixion shows that it was attributed to Michelangelo up until the late 19th century, and only later was it attributed to venusti by modern critics. Antonio Forcellino has analysed the work in relation to drawings by Michelangelo in the British Museum (inv. 1895-9-15-504r) and in the Louvre (inv. 698r; inv. 720r) often cited by critics with reference to this composition. More in general, the analysis compared the executive technique of Renaissance paintings, examining the question of transferring the work from the preparatory drawings to the painted surface, in works by Raphael and Michelangelo. Finally, images obtained by infra-red reflectography enabled Franca Persia and ombretta Cocco to examine the underdrawings of the paintings in question, comparing the different quality of the preparatory drawing, estimating the amount of information transferred during the reproduction of the drawing, and the technique used for this operation.