Rest on the Flight into Egypt

Illustrious sale to: Kuhnstalle Hamburger

The sheet depicts the episode of rest during the flight into Egypt. The scene is set outdoors, however not in the usual natural setting. In fact, the holy family stops to rest in a space surrounded by buildings, in an imaginary setting that recalls the sets of Tommaso Minardi and takes on unreal tones, in which the evocation of Egypt is underlined by the order of the columns and the presence of the lion statue. Compared to the previous drawings, this sheet clearly documents - as can be seen in the figure of the Virgin - the strong influence exerted on Sangiorgi's graphics by the purist turn that took place in Rome in the second half of the 1910s thanks to the work of the Nazarene artists present in the papal capital and the popularity of some famous paintings by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres.