Beskrivning: Se beskrivning i den engelska versionen.

Res. Katalogtext: Description in Italian Paintings: Three Centuries of Collecting, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2015, cat.no. 77:

ORMER INV. NOS.: 393 (M. 1804); KM 477.

PROVENANCE: Martelli 1804.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: NM Cat. 1867, p. 11 (as Romanelli); Sander
1872–76, III, p. 130; no. 393; NM Cat. 1990, p. 307 (as Romanelli,
his school).

A Roman god is sitting on a cloud in a red drape,
with a stick or spear in his right hand and a
cornucopia in his left. He turns his head backwards,
gazing up into the sky. The painting is a
companion piece to Mars (NM 152, cat. no. 76)
and, together with that and other paintings, may
originally also have formed a series of Roman
deities. In the Martelli catalogue of 1804, the god
is described as a Bacchus, but as he seems to be
crowned with laurel – instead of vine leaves –
and to be holding a spear, he may also represent
the brother and counterpart of Bacchus, the
Roman god Apollo. The original identification
with Bacchus is preserved in the 1990 Nationalmuseum
catalogue of European paintings,¹ but
the cornucopia with flowers, fruit and corn from
different seasons indicates an even more probable
identification as Vertumnus, the Roman god of
seasons and gardening.

The painting is attributed to Giovanni Francesco
Romanelli (1610–1662),² but reattributed
by Anthony M. Clark to Bartolomeo Schedoni
(1578–1615).³ In the 1990 catalogue, the original
attribution to Romanelli is preserved.⁴ In 2004
a similar painting of the Roman goddess Ceres
was sold at Sotheby’s. As that painting has a
strong resemblance in both style and scale to the
two gods in the Nationalmuseum collection, it
may also have been one of an original series of
paintings. The series is likely to have originally
adorned a ceiling or functioned as cartoons for a
fresco quadratura.
JE
1 NM Cat. 1990, p. 307.
2 NM Archives, Kongl. Museum, D:7, Inventarium över
målerisamlingen, 1861, KM 477.
3 NM Archives, Dokumentationsarkivet, Giovanni
Francesco Romanelli.
4 NM Cat. 1990, p. 307. [End]

Foto: Erik Cornelius / Nationalmuseum 2012