St. John the Baptist

Description:

St. John the Baptist, oil on panel by Giovanni Antonio Sogliani (Florence 1492-1544). The painting is a fragment of a larger panel, which contained perhaps a full-length figure in origin. As witnessed by the eye facing down (to the faithful) and the hand raised up, perhaps indicating the Savior. Although the style of the painting with the robustness of the system and its suffused chiaroscuro technique typical of Leonardo (with references to Rosso Fiorentino in the red crumpled cloth) evokes the compositions of Fra ‘Bartolomeo, but we are in front of one of his followers’ works, Giovanni Antonio Sogliani.

A Florentine artist of the early XVI Century, he specialized in devotional painting, coming from the workshop of San Marco, without the formal exaggerations of the style. Sogliani is considered to have developed a personal style by following the “methods of the Friar and of Albertinelli, combining them with the excessive smoothness of his teacher Lorenzo (di Credi), and with a certain hazy, blurred steam” as Cavalcaselle says. Probably acquired in 1861, however the channels which led the painting to Sicily and into the collection of the Baron of Mandralisca, are still unknown.