Sharing Questions of Attribution on Instagram
August 12 2020
Picture: Städel Museum, Frankfurt
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
As August is generally a rather quiet month for news in the world of old masters, I thought I'd share some interesting accounts that I've spotted on social media recently.
Bastian Eclercy (@bastianeclercy), Curator of Italian, French and Spanish paintings at the Städel Museum in Frankfurt has been sharing some geuinely interesting curatorial insights on his Instagram account.
His most recent post draws attention to the attribution of the painting of an unknown Lady pictured above. Acquired in 1850 as a portrait by Sebastiano del Piombo, the painting has since been given to no less than eight different artists over the past century. For the past twenty years it has been exhibited as a work by Peter de Kempeneer (c.1527-36), a Brussels born artist who spent some time in Italy. Eclercy points out that this artist's works from his later Spanish period are very difficult to match up to this painting. The particularly Flemish landscape, coupled with other elements that appear more Italian in style, has made pinning down a particular artist rather difficult.
