Artist: Francisco Vieira Lusitano (Attributed to) (Portugese, 1669-1783)
Medium: red chalk on paper
Dimensions: 9 11/16 in. x 7 3/8 in. (24.6 cm. x 18.7 cm.)
Credit Line: Bequest of the Honorable James ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ III
Accession Number: 1811.37
- "5" and red chalk monogram with letter P
Type: inscription and monogram
Location: verso
Materials: pen and brown ink - "No. 61 Il Portoguise"
Type: inscription
Location: verso of former mount (lost)
Materials: pen and ink
- James ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ III( Collector, Boston) - 1811.
- ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Museum of Art( Museum, Brunswick, Maine) 1811- . Bequest
- Old Master Drawings at ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College
- ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Museum of Art. ( 5/17/1985 - 7/7/1985)
- Clark Art Institute. ( 9/14/1985 - 10/27/1985)
- University of Kansas. ( 1/19/1986 - 3/2/1986)
- Art Gallery of Ontario. ( 5/17/1986 - 6/29/1986)
Type: catalogue Author: Henry Johnson Document Title: Catalogue of the ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Art Collections Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine Reference: no. 43, repr. in large paper edition Remarks: (as "Il Portoguise") Section Title: Pt. I, The ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ Drawings Date: 1885 Author: Rev. F. H. Allen Document Title: The ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ Collection Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine Location: pt. 3 Reference: no. 3, repr. Remarks: [five parts of four illustrations each, with individual texts] (as "Il Portoguise") Date: 1886 Type: catalogue Author: ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Museum of Art Document Title: ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ Museum of Fine Arts, Walker Art Building Edition: 4th Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine Reference: no. 43 Remarks: (as "Il Portoguise") Publisher: ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Section Title: Descriptive Catalogue of the . . . Date: 1930 Author: M. Benisovich Document Title: Gazette des Beaux-Arts, ser. 6, vol. 45 Location: pp. 113-116 Reference: repr. fig. 2 Remarks: (as Quillard) Section Title: "Quillard aux État-Unis -- Une Découverte" Date: 1955 Author: M. Eidelberg Document Title: Master Drawings, vol. 19, no. 1 Location: p. 29 Reference: repr. pl. 29a Remarks: (as Vieira the Younger) Section Title: "Quillard as Draughtsman" Date: 1981 Type: exhibition catalogue Author: David P. Becker Document Title: Old Master Drawings at ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Publ. Place: Brunswick, Maine Location: pp. 170-171 Reference: no. 79 (illus.) Publisher: ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Date: 1985 Per David Becker 7/25/09: Two recent references (both of which mention our drawing) are below; the Library owns Master Drawings. Luisa Arruda, ed., Vieira Lusitano (1699-1783): O desenho [exh. cat.] (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, 2000) [BCMA drawing repr. p. 86]. Nicholas Turner, "New Light on Vieira Lusitano as a Draftsman," Master Drawings, vol. 45, no. 3 (2007), pp. 367-86 [BCMA drawing discussed pp. 379-80, 386 note 37 (repr. p. 379, fig. 24).
This and another sheet in the ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ bequest, BCMA 1811.38, came to the collection with identical enigmatic inscriptions to "Il Portoguise," written on the original mounts (now lost), presumably a nickname and reference to the artist's country of origin. In 1955, Michel Benisovich interpreted the inscriptions as referring to Pierre Antoine Quillard (ca. 1701-33), a French follower of Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), who settled in Portugal. Martin Eidelberg dismissed the Quillard attribution on the basis of comparison with several authentic drawings (Eidelberg 29). He then proposed ascribing both ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ sheets to Francisco Vieira the Younger (1765-1805), whose nickname was "o Portuense," from his birthplace of Porto.
However, the two ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ sheets in question are probably not even by the same hand, despite superficial resemblances. This drawing of Venus and Adonis has been attributed to another Portuguese painter by the name of Francisco Vieira, the Lusitano, who worked in Rome for years. Both Luísa Arruda and Nicholas Turner have confirmed the attribution and connected the sheet to Vieira’s later Roman period in the 1720s. Arruda has even suggested that the drawing is autobiographical – Vieira is represented as Adonis and his wife, who was then confined to a convent by her family, is Venus (Arruda and Seabra Carvalho, 86-87). If the drawing is indeed from the second Roman period rather than the first, it was likely purchased by James ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ III rather than John Smibert, who left Italy before Vieira returned. Stylistically, the ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ drawing is similar to a number of woks by Vieira Lusitano, such as Perseus Freeing Andromeda (fig. 1) from the Bibloteca Nacional de Portugal.
David P. Becker (edited by Sarah Cantor)
References:
Arruda, Luísa and José Alberto Seabra Carvalho, eds. Vieira Lusitano 1699-1783: o desenho. Lisbon: Museo Nacional de Arte Antigua, 2000.
Eidelberg, Martin. "Quillard as Draughtsman,” Master Drawings 19, no. 1 (Spring 1981): 27-38.
Images:
Fig. 1: Francisco Vieira Lusitano Perseus Freeing Andromeda, ca. 1725, red chalk, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal,
Further Reading:
Prosperi Valenti Rodinò, Simonetta. "Ancora su Francisco Vieira, portoghese 'romanizzato.'" In Arte, Collezionismo, Conservazione: Scritti in onore di Marco Chiarini, edited by Miles Chappell, Mario Di Giampaolo, and Serena Padovani, 352-56. Florence: Giunti, 2004.
Commentary credited to David P. Becker (or not otherwise captioned) appeared in his catalogue Old Master Drawings at ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College (Brunswick: ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾ College Museum of Art, 1985).