Clipping, "A Giovanni Bellini Masterpiece," 5 November 1915

Morning
Post
11/5/15

A GIOVANNI BELLINI
MASTERPIECE
__________________________
SOLD TO AMERICA.
__________________________
We learn that the important painting "St.
Francis in the Desert," by Giovanni Bellini, has
been sold by Messrs. Colnaghi and Obach to
Mr. H. C. Frick, the well-known American collector.
The very interesting history of this
early Venetian picture was told in the Morning
Post on December 16, 1911.
Early in the Eighteenth 'Century the "St.
Francis" was offered to the Louvre, but owing
to some difficulty in regard to the period of payment
a sale was not effected. In 1852 it was sold
at Christie's for £735, the vendor being Sir J.
Murray. It was next seen at the Art Treasurey
Exhibition at Manchaster in 1857, when it was
the property of Captain Dingwall. Subsequently
it disappeared, and research on the part
of the critics of Italian art failed to discover its
whereabouts. The picture is first mentioned by
the "Anonimo Veneziano," a Sixteenth Century
writer, who saw it in the house of Messer Taddeo
Contarini in 1525, and said: "The oil picture,
on panel, representing St. Francis in the Desert,
is by Giovanni Bellini. It was commenced by
him for Messer Giovanni Michiel, and has in the
foreground a wonderfully elaborate and highly
finished landscape." The editor of the version
of this work, which was published in 1903, then
stated: "This picture is now in the collection
of Mr. S. Dingwall, in England.
It is justly considered to be one of the
earliest examples of realistic landscape painting
in Italy. The artist's signature, 'Joannes
Bellinus,' can be seen on the stump of a
tree. I have been unable, he continues, "to
find any information as to this collector, and Dr.
Frizzoni, the Italian critic, cannot remember
where he obtained his name or the statement that
he possessed the picture. I shall be glad of any
further information as to this important signed work."
The information given above was evidently
unknown to the editor, nor was he aware that
Mr. Morris Moore, in examination before the
Royal Commission on the National Gallery in
1853, said the "St. Francis was a work of
singular importance."
Its further history may be told briefly. The
Captain Dingwall referred to, having decided to
settle in Turkey, sold his house at Sunninghill
with all its contents to the late Mr. Thomas
Holloway, and after this transference the Bellini
and other pictures were as bad as lost for a long
time. The new owner did not realise the importance
of the paintings, it appears, until Mr.
Langton Douglas made known their artistic
value, after Mr. Holloway's death. The St.
Francis ultimately became the property of
Miss Driver, who lent it to the
Royal Academy Winter Exhibition, 1911-12,
where it won high favour, despite its
dirty condition. The panel was afterwards sent
to Milan to be cleaned by Professor Cavenaghi,
and when it was brought back to England the
great beauty of the painting was apparent.
Many expressive details were revealed in the
small figure of the Saint and in the sun-flushed
background of a white-walled North Italian
town. The picture belongs to the earlier years
of Bellini's third period, and is evidently later
than the "Transfiguration" in the Naples Gallery,
and the "Coronation," which has long been
removed from the Church of St. Francesco to a
municipal building in Pesaro, while it comes
before the "Allegory" in the Uffizi and the
"Madonna" of the Frari Church in Venice.
When the St. Francis came into the market
there as much competition for it before it
became the property of Messrs. Colnaghi, who
have sold it, as we have seen, to Mr. Frick, of
America.

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