LOT 0116

Roman Fayum Wooden Portrait of a Bearded Man

EGYPT, 3RD-4TH CENTURY A.D.

19 3/4 x 14 3/4 in. (8.53 kg total, 50 x 37.5 cm including frame).

An intimate portrait depicting a middle-aged man with a slightly doleful expression, receding hair with grey flecks, and a furrowed brow, wearing a white tunic with lilac-coloured clavi (vertical stripes) and white stitching over a white undertunic; holding a glass vessel containing red liquid in his right hand, most probably wine, whilst his left hand cradles a garland of roses, a ring visible on the little finger of his left hand; the figure set against a pale blue background, painted in tempera on a wooden panel; set in a glazed display frame.

International art market, by at least 1997.
with Sotheby’s, London, 12 June 1997, Western Asiatic Antiquities and Cylinder Seals from the Erlenmeyer Collection (Part II), no.338 (£40,000-£50,000).
Private collection of an Italian scholar, New York.

Accompanied by a copy of an Art Loss Register certificate no.S00271547.
Accompanied by copies of the relevant Sotheby's catalogue pages.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate number no.13315-257736.

Klaus Parlasca, in Bailey, D.M. (ed.), Archaeological Research in Egypt,1996, note 8; Sotheby's, Antiquities, London 12 June 1997,p.148, no.338, col.fig.p.149; Parlasca, K., Ritratti di Mummie. Serie B. Volume IV, (Rome, 2003), No. 689, Series B, pl. L.

See for a general work on these portraits, Walker, S. & Bierbrier, M., Ancient Faces, Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt, London, 1997.

From the late 19th century onwards, a large number of painted wooden portraits began to appear on the European and American art market, originating from the Fayum region of Egypt, to the southwest of Cairo, where wealthy Romano-Egyptian families buried their dead. Following ancient custom, the mummified body was fitted with a painted wood portrait over its face, preserving the likeness of the deceased for eternity.
In 1887, over three hundred such portraits were acquired by the Austrian dealer Theodor Graf (1840–1903) from the cemetery of Er-Rubayat, on the northeast side of the Fayum. Portraits from this area are characteristically identifiable by their clipped upper corners and the undertunics worn by the subjects, both features present in this work. During his lifetime, Graf sold ninety of these portraits, with the remainder disposed of by his heirs after his death. Examples from his collection entered many of the world's great institutions, including the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, the National Gallery, London, and the British Museum, London.

Two particularly close comparanda are of note. A portrait of a boy holding a garland and a glass vessel containing liquid, also from Er-Rubayat, is held in the Brooklyn Museum (see The Brooklyn Museum Handbook, Brooklyn, 1967, p. 100). An even closer parallel exists in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, likewise from Er-Rubayat (see E. Doxiadis, The Mysterious Fayum Portraits: Faces from Ancient Egypt, 1995, p. 221, no. 7; and S. Walker and M. Bierbrier, Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt, exhibition catalogue, London, 1997, p. 102, no. 95). Significantly, the distinguished scholar Dr Klaus Parlasca attributed both the Brooklyn and Getty portraits to a single anonymous master he designated as the Brooklyn Painter, and some years ago suggested that the present portrait may be attributed to the same hand. Should this attribution hold, this work joins a small and distinguished group of panels recognised as the output of one of the most accomplished artists working in Roman Egypt.