For half a century, the Cernesi family lived in the high-rise villa overlooking Florence where Renaissance artist Michelangelo grew up and later owned. The property includes several buildings, an orchard, and a painting of a muscular male nude carved into the wall of the former kitchen. Tradition holds that this work was painted by the young Michelangelo, but scholars are not sure.
Last year, the Cernage family sold the villa. They now hope to sell the mural, which was moved from its original location in 1979 to undergo a long-awaited restoration. Etched in charcoal or black chalk on plaster, the approximately 40-by-50-inch figure is well-built but slightly wrinkled and has been described by art historians as a “triton,” sea god, or “satyr.” It is specified that ” Part man, part beast.
For decades, this drawing has been lent to exhibitions in Japan, Canada, China, and most recently the United States as part of Michelangelo's work, and was featured in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's blockbuster 2017 exhibition, Michelangelo: The Divine Draftsman. and Designer'. The exhibition's catalog entry by Carmen C. Bambach, curator of drawings and prints at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, states that it is “the only surviving work that demonstrates Michelangelo's skill as a draftsman on a large scale.” It is written.
News that the painting will go on the market could widen what has been a rather subdued academic debate over the authorship of a work that has until now remained in private hands and largely out of public view. 5th century.
“It's very interesting. We definitely need to do more research,” said Cecilie Holberg, director of Florence's Accademia Gallery. She said she had already gone to see the drawings at the request of the Selnage family.
Several years ago, Culture Ministry officials declared the work to be of national importance, meaning it cannot leave Italy except on secondment. In the case of a sale, the Ministry of Culture has the right of preferential refusal to purchase works for the Italian State in line with the sale price.
The Holberg Museum, which houses some of the most famous sculptures, including Michelangelo's “David,” could be a good option if the state decides to exercise this option. In any case, Italy's strict heritage laws could have a major impact on the sale, limiting both the number of potential buyers and the sale price.
Works by Renaissance masters like Michelangelo rarely come to market, and when they do, they can command sensational prices. In 2022, Christie's in New York sold a Michelangelo sketch for more than 23 million euros.
But Carlo Orsi, an art dealer with galleries in Milan and London, says such works typically sell in Italy for a fraction of what their owners would earn if they were sold abroad. He and other experts said Italy's export laws were slowing down the market.
He added that while there are wealthy collectors in Italy, “they are not very forward-looking” and “it is virtually impossible to find customers for these items at those prices.”
At the same time, overseas buyers may be hesitant to purchase works they cannot take home with them, said Francesco Salamone, a lawyer specializing in cultural heritage law. “This cuts off foreign markets and makes the work less attractive from an economic point of view,” he added.
The family declined to put a price tag on the work, but one of its owners, Ilaria Cernesi, pointed out that it was insured for about $24 million when it went on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. (Experts say insurance prices do not necessarily reflect sales prices.)
But the Cernage family said it's not about money.
“We think this work deserves attention, appreciation and love,” said Ilaria Cernesi, a retired biologist whose family bought the villa in the 1970s.
In the late 19th century, Michelangelo's descendants sold the estate to a French count. It passed through several hands before being purchased by an American, who passed it on to an Italian heir, who then sold it to the Cernesi family. The previous owner doesn't seem to have thought much about this piece. “When we arrived, it was completely abandoned,” Cernesi recalls.
In 1979, the drawing was removed from the wall so that it could be restored at the Officio delle Pietre Dure in Florence, one of Italy's leading restoration laboratories. When it returned to the Sernage family, it was displayed in the vaulted dining room of the villa until the family decided it was best kept in a more secure location. The drawings were moved to a protected warehouse on the outskirts of Florence.
Cernesis traces the drawing's attribution to Michelangelo's contemporary biographer Giorgio Vasari, who wrote that the young artist honed his skills by painting on “paper and walls.” Vasari does not indicate exactly where he painted it. Some people who have visited this villa over the centuries have even seen Michelangelo's graffiti there.
When this drawing first began circulating in exhibitions, some of the catalog entries attributing it to Michelangelo were written by Italian Renaissance expert Giorgio Bonsanti, who also oversaw the 1979 restoration. . “I can't imagine anyone going into Michelangelo's house and painting figures on the kitchen walls,” he says.
Bonsanti was a pupil of Charles de Tournai, a Hungarian-born naturalized American who wrote a five-volume study of Michelangelo, which states that the artist painted the mural when he was a teenager. It is said that Comparisons of Sernage's drawing with Michelangelo's study of a bearded man, now in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, have led some scholars to date the work to Michelangelo's mid-20s. ing.
Bambach, the Metropolitan Museum of Art curator, called the work “a neglected Michelangelo work” in a 2013 paper. She declined an interview request for this article, citing the museum's policy not to comment on works for sale. However, she acknowledged that she stands by the article and her attribution.
A footnote to Bambach's article provides a detailed breakdown of the “long history of attribution” between those who support Michelangelo's authorship, those who oppose it, and those who are undecided.
Paul Joannides, a Michelangelo expert and emeritus professor of art history at the University of Cambridge, said there was “a lot of support” for Michelangelo's attribution. “However,” he wrote in his email, To me, this piece looks clumsy, poorly foreshortened, has rough facial expressions, lacks expressiveness, and is generally of low quality. It's hard to believe that even a very young Michelangelo was able to paint so badly. ”
Francesco Carioti, a Renaissance expert who teaches at the Scuola Normale School in Pisa, Italy, said if the work was by Michelangelo, he wasn't at his best. He added that the artist was “so judgmental of himself” that he destroyed many of his early works at the end of his life. “Perhaps he forgot this,” Mr. Carioti said.
The Cernesis have not contacted dealers, antique dealers or auction houses to help with the sale, but lawyer Salamone said it is very rare for an important work of art to be sold without an intermediary. He said there is. Number of potential customers.
“Those are details we will deal with, nothing has been decided yet,” said Ilaria Cernesi, one of six family members who own the piece.
She said she knew the export ban would affect sales. “It's clear that people want to lower prices, but there are limits beyond which they can't go,” she says.
