ANTONIO MONDINO

Varese (?) — active first half of the 17th century

Joseph, the Christ Child and the Infant St. John the Baptist in the Carpenter's Workshop

brunaille in oil on paper. 147/8 x 103/8" (380 x 264 mm).

provenance:
Rosella Gilli, Milan (as Luigi Mirandori, il Genovesino);
Christies, London, Old Master Drawings sale, April 1990 (as Morazzone);
private collection, NY.

literature:
Jonathan Bober & Giulio Bora, Capolavori della Suida-Manning Collection, exhibition catalogue, Museo Civico, Cremona, 2001, p. 60, I13, illustrated.

Though formerly attributed to Morazzone and compared by me to a painting in the Manning Collection of the Holy Family with Elizabeth and St. John the Baptist in Joseph's Workshop,1 the present brunaille, like the Manning picture, has instead been recently given by Giulio Bora to Antonio Mondino. As kindly pointed out to me by Jonathan Bober, Bora catalogues both works2 as by this once faithful student and collaborator of Morazzone's, Antonio Mondino.

Bora suggests a date for both our brunaille and the Manning picture to the latter years of the 1630's. This he suggests despite noting that the present work retains an uncluttered structure like a Morazzone, while the Manning picture reveals an independent turn to a nervous intensity and crowdedness that takes the artist in a new direction. Part of that change includes bringing the out-of-doors indoors via a window while in our brunaille we are taken instead to other depths of plane by the staircase which leads to another plane outside the immediate scene of the subject. The prominence of Joseph in both works is indicative of the new devotion to him as a result of the Counter-Reformation.

Mondino's ouevre and reputation suffer from a complete lack of biographical data. He appears to have worked in and around Varese, though an 18th c. account claims that he worked largely elsewhere, travelling the world. He invented his own personal style distinguished by a specific facial morphology which is sharper than Morazzone's, displaying more imagination than his master and a greater interest in line and use of chiaroscuro. His known paintings are dated from 1617 through 1626 to 1633.

The magic of the present interior scene is due to the real-life atmosphere created by the artist. Joseph's workbench, beautifully lit, reveals his tools and wood shavings, by-products of his recent labor. Children's books are stacked on the floor and the Baptist's attention is completely engaged by a charming toy, a bird on a string, perhaps whittled by the proprietor himself. Though Joseph is working, he glances with tender concern over his shoulder at the children.

1

Mia N Weiner, Old Master Drawings, exhibition catalogue, November, 1990, cat. # 20.

2

See litt.