Samson lies asleep, next to him the beautiful Delilah, who is handed scissors by an old woman in the background to rob the hero of his powerful hair.
The moving scene, which for more than a hundred years has only been attributed to the Italian school, is presented at a market-fresh 152 by 193 centimeters: It now emerged that the Bolognese artist Lionello Spada probably created the large-format work in the second decade of the 17th century It is valued at 50,000 to 80,000 euros: it will start as a top lot at Van Ham's “Classic Week” on June 2nd in Cologne.
Among the 282 “Fine Art” lots on offer, the works of three artists stand out: One of Artemisia Gentileschi's favorite subjects was the depiction of Mary Magdalene in ecstasy. The version offered, measuring 68 by 48 centimeters and coming from private German ownership, was painted by the baroque artist with the assistance of her colleague Onofrio Palumbo between 1645 and 1650; it should raise 30,000 to 40,000 euros. Artemisia's contemporary Sofonisba Anguissola is represented with a portrait of a young boy whose elegant clothes and knowing smile suggest noble origins. The 37 by 28 centimeter wooden panel comes fresh from the market from a Swiss collection and probably dates from the artist's Sicilian time, when Anguissola married the governor of Paternò in 1573 (estimate 35.000 / 45,000 euros). Both baroque artists are currently represented in the big show at the Palazzo Reale in Milan, which runs until July.
And Emilie Preyer shows with one of her detailed and fine still lifes of fruits and nuts that she is in no way inferior to her father, the Düsseldorf still life painter Johann Wilhelm Preyer (20,000 / 25,000). Carl Spitzweg's lovely genre representation "The laundry place in front of the small town" from 1879 is called up, which only reveals amusing details on closer inspection: for example the idle work of the laundress, who has to keep both cats and toddlers from having to use the fresh lengths of fabric that lie in the sun to bleach (50,000 / 70,000). Two oil paintings by Joos van Cleve and Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio depicting the “Holy Family” and “Madonna and Child” are valued at 40,000 to 60,000 euros each.
Parrasio Michiel captured three graces in his large-format picture “Triumph of Venus”, whose naked bodies are shown in different views. While the middle woman leans full-length and fills the image format vertically against a stone bench, only the back and profiles of the other two secondary figures that flank her can be recognized (40,000 / 60,000). A cute group of children by Friedrich Kallmorgen, which plays on the high bank of the Elbe near Lauenburg, costs 30,000 to 40,000 euros. Franz Xaver Simm's elegant “harp player” is estimated at 20,000 to 25,000 euros. Van Ham's Fine Art auction is expected to bring in a total of 820,000 euros.