Giovanni dalla Gabella, well paid card painter in Ferrara 1423

Huck

I redraw the earlier argumentation for "Giovanni di Paolo" as the painter "Giovanni da Gabella in Ferrara 1423" based on this page

http://www.bottegadartetoscana.it/det_opere_eng.asp?codice=5

as I discovered later that "Biccherna 'Gabella' " is a general terminus for small wall-paintings as discribed at this page:
http://www.fabernett.com/cgi-bin/fab455/43673
... especially used in Siena

... so my error

It stays, that we have a very well paid painter "Giovanni da Gabella" active 1423 in Ferrara, who disappears ... either he died or he stayed unrecorded in the future or he changed his name

(is noted at this page)
http://trionfi.com/0/d/13

In Ferrara Giovanni dalla Gabella is noted twice, the other record ...

A wedding gift for a maid of honour

(Parisina Malatesta, wife of Niccolò d'Este, asks the court administrators to pay for a gift of cassoni for one of her "maids-of-honour. Original source: A. Francesschini, Artisti a Ferrara in età umanistica e rinascimentale: testimonianze archivistiche. Parte I dal 1431 al 1471 (Ferrara 1993), p. 119)

January 1423
"We want you, our factors, to give and to pay Master Giovanni della Gabella, painter, 25 ducats in coins for his expenses and labour for two painted and gilded chests, which Pellegrina, our maid of honour and daughter of Zoexe, is having [as donora] for her wedding."

http://books.google.com/books?id=Ja...g=ywO8BQZAmptGi0M4sG3Mv5vYtXo&hl=en#PPA247,M1
Women in Italy, 1350 - 1650" by Mary Rogers and Paolo Tingali

Both commissions, the playing card deck and the 2 chests, are paid with high prizes, so it isn't plausible, that "Giovanni dalla Gabella" had been an otherwise unknown artist.
The mentioned servant Zoexe (in the chests document) plays later a dramatic role in the scandal of Parisina's death ...

http://trionfi.com/0/d/14/
http://trionfi.com/0/d/15/

... also he is the same man, who imported for Parisina the "VIII Imperatori cards from Florence".

http://trionfi.com/0/p/06/
 

Huck

The Italian Wiki informs to "Gabella":

Il termine gabella (dall'arabo dialettale gabēla, variante di qabāla, passando per il latino medievale gabulum) era utilizzato originariamente in Francia per indicare le tasse su merci di qualunque tipo. Con il passare del tempo il significato si restrinse gradualmente fino a indicare l'imposta sul sale. La gabella emigrationis era la tassa corrisposta da un emigrante per il capitale che portava con sé. La gabella hereditatis era la tassa dovuta per mandare all'estero un dono o un'eredità.

So "Gabella" means (possibly) a sort of tax ...

There are locations with the name "Gabella" (or similar) in Italy ... the most near seems to be near Ancona and has nowadays 357 inhabitants. It's not sure, that it already existed in 15th century.
 

Huck

Huck said:
I redraw the earlier argumentation for "Giovanni di Paolo" as the painter "Giovanni da Gabella in Ferrara 1423" based on this page

http://www.bottegadartetoscana.it/det_opere_eng.asp?codice=5

as I discovered later that "Biccherna 'Gabella' " is a general terminus for small wall-paintings as discribed at this page:
http://www.fabernett.com/cgi-bin/fab455/43673
... especially used in Siena

... so my error

I took (after my discovery of an identity between "Giovanni della Gabella" and "Giovanni di Paolo", of which I thought reason to redraw it) a walk to the library and detected a "Giovanni di Paolo" in a small entry of a dictionary about miniaturists. This entry included the information, that this "Giovanni di Paolo" to have been 1423 (the year in which Giovanni della Gabella impressed Ferrara) in Ferrara ... so, in spite of my own doubts about this connection, there exists the possibility, that Giovanni di Paolo really had been in Ferrara.

Then I took a larger dictionary about artists and detected under "Giovanni della Gabelle (Gabella)", that he is said to have worked longer time for the court in Ferrara from 1423 - 1439, and his works had been playing cards and a cassone (as noted in 1423) and so curious things like paperhangings, embroidery, bed curtains and furniture (? possibly the cassone ?).

Then I took in the dictionary the entry "Giovanni di Paolo" and there I found nothing about a stay or an occasionally presence in Ferrara, but I found, that Giovanni di Paolo had earlier before 1439 commissions from a Milanese merchant (from this context I concluded, that this might have been a sign of presence in Northern Italy) and that Giovanni di Paolo had appeared under various names. Around the date of 1440 Giovanni di Paolo settled in Siena and had a long life there.

From all this I took the conclusion, that Giovanni della Gabella and Giovanni di Paolo might be still the same person ... just the case of a suspicion, not more.

I speculate, that Gabella's strange occupations (paperhangings, embroidery, bed curtains) might have the context of textil-printing technique (stamping), which possibly would fit with his occupation as a playing card painter.
 

Huck

I found a work, which is given to Giovanni di Paolo from 1421 (other researchers say, that no work exists before 1426) and it is at ...

wedding.jpg


and is a "Wedding Casket with the Triumph of Venus"

http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/g/giovanni/paolo/index.html

... somehow a similar object to the Cassone, which is mentioned for Parisina's lady in 1423 (Gabella's second production in the year 1423). The object is in the Louvre, the identification and date is possibly given at the inscription (I can't read it completely and have my doubts), so possibly rather sure.


*********
This is a biography of Giovanni di Paolo

Biography

Giovanni di Paolo – also known as Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia – was born in Siena, probably towards the end of the fourteenth century. Although his training is not recorded, it is likely that he had early Lombard patrons, and was influenced by Lombardian book illumination. His first recorded commission was in 1417 for a Book of Hours, and Giovanni executed both illuminations and panel paintings throughout his career. In 1420 he was paid for two important, now untraced, paintings for the convent at San Domenico and for the monastery of St Marta in Siena. The first work securely attributed to him is the Triumph of Venus 1421 (Louvre, Paris).

In the early 1420s Giovanni painted four altarpieces for San Domenico, Siena. The panel with Christ suffering and triumphant (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena) is probably from the first. The other polyptychs – the Pecci altarpiece 1426, the Branchini altarpiece 1427, and the Guelfi altarpiece 1445 – are now dispersed. In the Pecci altarpiece, Giovanni adhered to the Late Gothic tradition, with its sinuous lines and decorative details, while the Branchini altar shows the influence of Gentile da Fabriano. Giovanni joined the Sienese painters’ guild, the Ruolo dei pittori, in 1428, and became its rettore in 1441. In 1436, he produced the predella of the Fondi Altarpiece for San Francesco, Siena, and the Madonna della Misericordia, for the Servite church, Siena. In the period 1438–44 Giovanni created sixty-one miniatures of the Paradisoto illustrate Dante’s Divine Comedy (British Museum, London). In 1440 he painted the Crucifixion for the church of the Osservanza, Siena (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena). In the mid-1440s Giovanni collaborated with Sano di Pietro on a panel (untraced) for the Compagnia di S Francesco. He also produced his only fresco, the Crucifixion, in the hermitage of St Leonardo al Lago, and the Antiphonal made for the Augustinian monks at Lecceto (Biblioteca Communale degli Intronati, Siena). Two masterpieces of 15th-century Sienese art, Giovanni’s Paradise c.1445 and theCreation, and the Expulsion from Paradise c.1445 (both Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), are generally held to have been part of the Guelfi altarpiece, the last painted for San Domenico.

From the 1440s Giovanni created numerous fine, artistically mature works, many of which are dated. He returned to earlier themes, devising new and innovative solutions. He also depicted subjects rarely treated in Sienese art, including scenes from the lives of Sts Catherine of Siena, Ansanus, John the Baptist, Clare and Galganus. In 1445 and a decade later he painted two versions of the Coronation of the Virgin (S Andrea, Siena and Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York). Between 1447 and 1449 Giovanni executed an important altarpiece for the church of Sta Maria della Scala, Siena, now dispersed. In the 1450s his style showed more clearly defined volumes and spatial relations, features which are evident in the architectural backgrounds of his most ambitious narrative cycle, the scenes from the Life of St John the Baptist. The St Nicholas altarpiece 1453 (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena) shows a close adherence to the style of Sassetta, an interest which proved fertile and around 1450–55 led to the production of some of his greatest works, including the altarpiece the Virgin and Child with SS Peter Damian, Thomas, Clare and Ursula(Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena) and perhaps four predella panels with scenes from the Life of St Clare(various collections). The altarpiece which Giovanni produced in 1463, for Pius II’s new cathedral in Pienza, remains in situ. His last works are the predella of the San Galgano Altarpiece, c.1470 and the altarpiece for San Silvestro di Staggia, once signed and dated 1475 (both Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena). From the Sienese quarter known as the Poggio dei Malavolti, near Sant-Agostino, Giovanni di Paolo made his will and died in 1482.

Beside the sentence "Although his training is not recorded, it is likely that he had early Lombard patrons, and was influenced by Lombardian book illumination. " the life description gives the impression, that he always had been in Siena and not in Northern Italy.
 

Bernice

Ah! that 2nd link is dead now Cerulean. But the images via google are lovely - I'm surprised that no-one has created a deck with them! ......or have they?... thinking of the Dante Tarot. I've not seen the cards because I thought it to be a RW clone. I'll go and look.

Thank you Huck for that biography of Giovanni di Paolo and your detective work re. his painting card decks. An acclaimed artist of his time, but now ignored/unrenowned.... sad.

Bee :)