Donato Creti
Cremona, 1671 – Bologna, 1749
Portrait of a young girl or young man
Black chalk on paper.
238 x 180 mm – 9 3/8 x 7 1/16 in.
Watermark: Anchor in a circle topped with a cross.
After training with his father Giuseppe Creti, Quadrature painter (perspectives), Donato Creti continues his apprenticeship in Bologna with Lorenzo Rapparini then Lorenzo Pasinelli. In the latter’s workshop, he meets the young Pietro Ercole Fava whose father Alessandro becomes his protector and patron. Working for twenty years at the Fava palace, he also received orders for palace decorations such as the Palazzo Pepoli Campogrande in Bologna or the palace of the family of Counts of Novellara. In 1709 Donato Creti appeared among the founders of the Accademia Clementina or the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna, of which he became director in 1712. The importance of drawing for Donato Creti is quickly signaled by his contemporaries. Biographer Giampietro Zanotti notifies in his work as early as 1739 Storia dell’Accademia Clementina that he drew with the pen, without a draft underlying the black chalk, on sheets, covering them with landscapes or scenes with many characters[ 1 ] and that he liked to offer them[ 2 ]. Artist Marcantonio Franceschini greets the artist as a grandissimo disgnatore[ 3 ], likewise the young painter Crespi praises : penna molto felice[ 4 ] and specifies that not a day went by without Creti drawing on any medium : Altreo non faceva disignare su libri, sulle carte, e perfino sulle tavole, e su i muri col carbon, e coll’inchiostro[ 5 ].
Donato Creti creates, in black chalk on gray paper, a portrait of a young woman slightly three-quarters tall whose gaze is directed downwards. Her loose mid-length hair falls over her shoulders. The identity of the model is not known but another sheet (fig. 1) seems to reproduce the same face with the hair raised in a bun [6]. We find the acute and nervous line of the Cremonese artist who creates, with great suavity, the modeling and contour of this delicate face.
Condition report – Small spots on the entire sheet. Two parallel traces on the left part of the forehead and hair.
[1] Giampietro Zanotti, Storia dell’Accademia Clementina di Bologna, Dalla Volpe, Bologna, 2 vols., 1739, vol. II, pp. 117-118: “Quello che fa meraviglia si è il vederne tanti [disegni], et tanti fatti a penna, e paesi e storie di molte figure, e sapere, che senza prima averne sulla carta fatto alcun segno col lapis. Io credo, che in questo egli sia singulare, vedendo a qual bellezza e perfezione son condotti“. [2] Ditto, pp. 120: “Alcun pittore non fu mai più liberale dei suoi disegni e v’ha più d’uno, che n’ebbe in dono moltissimi“. [3] DC Miller, “Donato Creti”, Burlington Magazine, CXI, 1969, pp. 25-32. [4] Luigi Crespi, Felsina Pittrice. Quick from ‘Pittori bolognesi, Tomo III, che serve di Supplemento all’opera del Malvasia, Bologna, 1769, pp. 259. [5] Marco Riccomini, Donato Creti. The opere su carta. Catalogo ragionato, Turin, 2012, p. 13; L. Crespi, op. cit, 1769, p. 257. [6] Head of a young woman, Black stone and white highlights, 250 x 166 mm (London, Sotheby’s sale, March 23, 1972, n° 96). See. Marco Riccomini, op. cit., 2012, p. 67, n° 81.5.
