Pseudo Salini

A GENRE SCENE OF A SEATED BOY WITH BAT AND BALL, A COLLARED SHEEP, A BASKET OF DOVES AND PAIR OF DUCKS

ACTIVE IN ROME IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE 17TH CENTURY

oil on canvas, unlined
38 by 51.1/4 in.; 96.4 by 130 cm.

Provenance:
"Pseudo Salini" is the moniker ascribed to a group of paintings that mirror the style of Roman Caravaggist, Tommaso Salini. Many of the paintings now grouped under that attribution had formerly been erroneously ascribed to Salini himself until the 1980s when Victoria Markova reexamined the painter's oeuvre.1 The paintings ascribed to the so-called Pseudo Salini not all by the same hand and while many are likely to be Roman and tend to derive from works by Salini and Caravaggio. This painting is likely by the same hand as the Boy Playing with a Dog and Other Animals, which sold at Sotheby's London in 2011.2 Not only is the boy depicted remarkable similar physiologically to that in the present painting, the artist has again included a wooden bat and red and white leather covered ball.

1. V. Markova, "Alcune nuove proposte per Tommaso Salini'" in Paragone, 40, no. 475, 1989.
2. Anonymous sale, London, Sotheby's, 5 July 2011, lot 140.