File:Artgate Fondazione Cariplo - Ceresa Carlo, Ritratto di gentiluomo.jpg

The painting entered the Cariplo Collection in 1991 with the incorporation of the IBI Collection. The large canvas, a life-size portrait of a young gentleman dressed in the Spanish fashion, was included in the catalogue of 1995. Its attribution to Carlo Ceresa, an artist from Bergamo active in the central decades of the 17th century, was suggested at the time by Eugenia Bianchi in her painstaking description. The scholar identified a number of portraits, including the one of Francesco Boselli, as the closest terms of reference for the Cariplo painting, characterized by a similar degree of “firmness and colouring of the face”. Bianchi also noted parallels in terms of realism and subtle psychological introspection with the work of Pier Francesco Cittadini, again born in Lombardy but settled in Emilia, whose Portrait of a Gentleman in Armour with a Red Bow is also part of the Cariplo Collection. In general terms, she suggests the possibility of contact with the portrait painting of the nearby Farnese court on the basis of the descriptive depiction of dress.

The thesis put forward by Eugenia Bianchi was subsequently challenged by Andrea Spiriti in the catalogue of 1998. Without arguing his case in any detail, Spiriti chose to shift the question of attribution towards very distant and foggy shores, suggesting its identification as a “post-Cromwellian” English work in a period when the fashion and figurative grammar of the portrait were shared by the whole of Europe. The points of reference were Van Dyck and Peter Lely, but the scholar failed to cite any examples as terms of comparison in support of his hypothesis.

Spiriti’s argument appears somewhat flimsy, whereas the grounds put forward by Bianchi prove very solid. It is therefore possible to return to her attribution and indeed to identify further terms of comparison in addition to the above-cited Portrait of Francesco Boselli, where the same detail of the clenched fist can be seen. The Marquise Holding a Sprig of Orange Blossom displays the same attentive depiction of lace and the Portrait of a Gentleman published by Luisa Vertova in her monographic study of the artist (‘Carlo Ceresa. Tutte le opere’, in I Pittori Bergamaschi, Bergamo, Poligrafiche Bolis 1984, p. 724) shows similarities in terms of atmosphere and stylistic approach. The official character of the composition does not prevent the artist from offering an immediate and naturalistic reading of the character portrayed, this displaying fidelity to the Lombard models and especially to the approach of Moroni who was also from Bergamo. Comparison with other works featuring sumptuous dress of the same type makes it probable that the portrait was painted around the 1640s, as the fashion shifted towards greater sobriety and the predominance of dark colours in the later decades.