Allegory

probably c. 1500

Piero di Cosimo

Artist, Florentine, 1462 - 1522

A winged, nearly nude woman with ivory-white skin, partially wrapped in a crimson-red cloak, delicately holds up the reins of a gray horse as it rears toward her in this vertical painting. They stand on a roughly oval-shaped disk of gray rock carpeted with mustard-yellow growth. Stubby brown branches jut out from its sides. To our right, the woman’s body faces us as she looks toward the horse, to our left. The woman’s honey-brown hair is braided and wound into coils over her temples. The rest is pulled back, and tendrils frame her face and fall over her shoulders. A strand of pearls drapes along her hairline between the braids. Her hazel-brown eyes and slightly parted pale lips are set in a round face. Tall wings edged in earth brown and filled with a blend of ivory, caramel brown, and mustard yellow reach up along either side of her head. Her long cloak is knotted on at her right shoulder, on our left, and drapes across her clavicle, over her other shoulder, and down her back. One corner wraps across her hips and mid-section, and drapes over her outstretched left arm, on our right, revealing bare legs. A cream-white and caramel-brown striped sash under the cloak is tied over one shoulder and knotted under her bare breasts. She holds a short, dark brown tree branch covered with spiky leaves in her left hand, our right. The other hand is raised to daintily hold one end of the thin gold string wound around the horse’s neck. The horse balances on its hind legs with its front hooves dangling in mid-air. His body is angled toward the woman, but his head turns back as he faces us with his mouth hanging open. The horse's head and tail seem too small for its large body. Along the bottom edge of the composition, in front of the spit of land, a mermaid with long blond hair and two charcoal-gray tails swims with arms extended in front of her. The water is pale beige closest to us and transitions to a light blue as it recedes into the distance, where it blends into the milky white sky. Birds fly over ghostly, powder-blue headlands studded with caramel-brown trees in the distance to our left. A boat sails in the water in the distance to our right.

Media Options

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Best known for his portraits, altarpieces, and religious and mythological narratives, Piero di Cosimo created only one surviving allegory. In this painted personification of abstract concepts, a winged woman, largely nude despite her two layers of mantles secured by knots, extends a sprig of juniper and daintily holds a rearing stallion by a string. She has been convincingly identified as Chastity, who effortlessly contains the forces of Lust embodied by her virile steed. The figures occupy a rocky island adorned with barren trees, surrounded by a misty waterscape. The double-tailed mermaid who energetically parts the seas before them may be understood as a siren symbolizing the dangers of carnal passion.

In the Renaissance, recondite allegories such as this often adorned the covers and reverses of portraits, testifying to the virtues of their sitters. Piero’s panel may originally have decorated his likeness of Simonetta Vespucci in the guise of Cleopatra (Musée Condé, Chantilly). The work’s spare execution and delicate gray tonalities, punctuated by the brilliant red of the lady’s costume, would befit this secondary function. The evocative, even impressionistic atmosphere that envelops the figures is typical of Piero, whose powers of fantastic invention are matched by careful attention to the natural prospect.

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 20

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on panel

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 56.2 x 44.1 cm (22 1/8 x 17 3/8 in.)
    framed: 74.3 x 62.2 x 7 cm (29 1/4 x 24 1/2 x 2 3/4 in.)

  • Accession

    1939.1.160

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Casa Gravaghi, Parma, by 1870. [1] (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Florence and Rome); sold 1935 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York, NY;[2] gift 1939 to NGA.
[1] Galli, Aldo. “Tavole toscane del Tre e Quattrocento nella collezione di Alfonso Tacoli Canacci.” In Invisibile agli occhi. Atti della Giornata di studio in ricordo di Lisa Venturini. Firenze, Fondazione Robert Longhi, 15 dicembre 2005. Florence, 2005. Nicoletta Baldini, ed. Florence, 2007: 13-28, esp. 28 n. 69; repro. fig. 31.
[2] See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/189.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1938

  • Piero di Cosimo, Schaeffer Galleries, New York, 1938, no. 6.

2015

  • Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence, National Gallery of Art, Washington; Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, 2015, no. 17 (English catalogue), no. 11 (Italian catalogue), repros.

Bibliography

1941

  • Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 152-153, no. 271.

1942

  • Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 245, repro. 167.

1944

  • Frankfurter, Alfred M. The Kress Collection in the National Gallery. New York, 1944: 40, repro.

1945

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1945 (reprinted 1947, 1949): 62, repro.

1946

  • Douglas, Robert Langton. Piero di Cosimo. Chicago, 1946: 40, 119, pls. XX, XXI.

1958

  • Morselli, Paolo. “Piero di Cosimo, saggio di un catalogo delle opere.” L’ Arte 23 (1958): 86.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 76, repro.

1963

  • Grassi, Luigi. Piero di Cosimo e il problema della conversione al ‘500 nella pittura fiorentina ed emiliana. Rome, 1963: 71-72.

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Florentine School. 2 vols. London, 1963: 1:177.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 103.

1966

  • Bacci, Mina. Piero di Cosimo. Milan, 1966: 78, cat. 17.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 91, repro.

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XV-XVI Century. London, 1968: 118-119, fig. 287, as The Propagation of Coral.

1970

  • Hull, Vida Joyce. "Piero di Cosimo's Allegory in the National Gallery, Washington: An Iconographical Study." M.A. thesis, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 1970.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, MA, 1972: 164, 645, as Allegory of Chastity?

1973

  • Finley, David Edward. A Standard of Excellence: Andrew W. Mellon Founds the National Gallery of Art at Washington. Washington, 1973: 79.

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XVI-XVIII Century. London, 1973: 392.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 268, repro.

1976

  • Bacci, Mina. L’opera completa di Piero di Cosimo. Milan, 1976: 86, cat. 7.

1978

  • King, Marian. Adventures in Art: National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. New York, 1978: 24, pl. 5.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:368-369; 2:pl. 267, as The Propagation of Coral.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 104, no. 75, color repro.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 311, repro.

1993

  • Gagliardi, Jacques. La conquête de la peinture: L’Europe des ateliers du XIIIe au XVe siècle. Paris, 1993: 812.

1996

  • Capretti, Elena, and Anna Forlani Tempesti. Piero di Cosimo: catalogo completo. Florence, 1996: 101, cat. 9.

2006

  • Geronimus, Dennis. Piero di Cosimo: Visions Beautiful and Strange. New Haven and London, 2006: 69-74, 75, 98, fig. 47, as Allegory of Chastity Triumphing Over Lust.

2007

  • Galli, Aldo. “Tavole toscane del Tre e Quattrocento nella collezione di Alfonso Tacoli Canacci.” In Nicoletta Baldini, ed. Invisibile agli occhi. Atti della Giornata di studio in ricordo di Lisa Venturini. Firenze, Fondazione Robert Longhi, 15 dicembre 2005. Florence, 2007: 13-28, esp. 28 n. 69, fig. 31.

2009

  • Schumacher, Andreas, et al. Botticelli: Likeness, Myth, Devotion. Exh. cat. Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main, 2009: 216, fig. 111, as Allegory of Chastity.

2010

  • Tazartes, Maurizia. Piero di Cosimo “ingegno astratto e difforme.” Florence, 2010: 35-37, fig. 8.

2012

  • Fiorenza, Giancarlo. “Tadpoles, Caterpillars and Mermaids: Piero di Cosimo’s Poetic Nature.” In Melinda Schlitt, ed. Gifts in Return: Essays in Honour of Charles Dempsey. Toronto, 2012: 169, fig. 6.4.

2014

  • Chiodo, Sonia, and Serena Padovani, eds. The Alana Collection, Newark, Delaware, USA. Vol. III: Italian Paintings from the 14th to 16th Century. Florence, 2014: 226.

2015

  • Hirschauer, Gretchen A. ““Building Castltes in the Air”: The Story of Piero di Cosimo.” In Gretchen Hirschauer and Dennis Geronimus, eds. Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2015: 3.

  • Padovani, Serena. “Piero and Portraiture.” In Gretchen Hirschauer and Dennis Geronimus, eds. Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2015: 38, 39..

  • Luchs, Alison. “Creatures Great, Small, and Hybrid: The Natural and Unnatural Wonders in Piero’s Art.” In Gretchen Hirschauer and Dennis Geronimus, eds. Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2015: 66, 68.

  • Brilliant, Virginia. “Piero di Cosimo in America.” In Gretchen Hirschauer and Dennis Geronimus, eds. Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2015: 88, 89.

  • Padovani, Serena. “La mostra su Piero di Cosimo: una proposta per il suo percorso nel contesto contemporaneo.” In Elena Capretti et al, eds. Piero di Cosimo 1462-1522: Pittore eccentrico fra Rinascimento e Maniera. Exh. cat. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, 2015: 31.

  • Acidini, Cristina. “Le metamorfosi della “Bella Simonetta.”” In Elena Capretti et al, eds. Piero di Cosimo 1462-1522: Pittore eccentrico fra Rinascimento e Maniera. Exh. cat. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, 2015: 86-87, fig. 8.

2024

  • McHam, Sarah Blake. Piero di Cosimo: Eccentricity and Delight. London, 2024: 93-95, fig. 31.

Wikidata ID

Q20174743

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