Images(2)

Memento Mori: Death Comes to the Table

Artist Monogramist DC (Domenico Carpinoni?) Italian, 1566–1658

Datecirca 1630–1640

MediumOil on canvas

Dimensions44 15/16 x 62 3/16 in. (114.1 x 158 cm)
Frame: 52 3/4 x 70 1/8 in. (134 x 178.1 cm)

ClassificationsPaintings

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the State of North Carolina and the North Carolina State Art Society (Robert F. Phifer Bequest), by exchange

Object number2013.17

On View

Not on view

ProvenanceCreated on the Italian peninsula during the second quarter of the 17th century. Private collection, Bergamo, IT by 1984. [Porro & C., Milan, IT, May 9, 2007, lot 33]; [Galerie G. Sarti, Paris, 2007–2013]; sold to NCMA, December 11, 2013.Published ReferencesUgo Ruggeri, “Domenico Carpinoni,” in I Pittori Bergamaschi dal XIII al XIX secolo: Il Seicento II (Bergamo: Poligrafiche Bolis Bergamo, 1984), 222, 242–243, 268. (Entries for La morte appare a un banchetto [private collection, Bergamo] and La partita di carte [private collection, Milan], as by Domenico Carpinoni, a Bergamask follower of Palma il Giovane who was praised in his day as a copyist and plagiarist, and who exploited engravings of other compositions for that purpose).

Franco Moro, entry in Il Seicento a Bergamo (exhibition catalogue), ed. F. Rossi (Bergamo: Cariplo, 1987), cat. no. 68, 244–245 (as La morte appare ad un banchetto by Domenico Carpinoni, exhibited as a pendant with cat. no. 67, La partita a carte; both paintings attributed to Domenico Carpinoni).

Benedict Nicolson, Caravaggism in Europe, ed. L. Vertova, 3 vols., (Turin: Umberto Allemandi & C., 1990), 1:104–105, vol. 2, illus. fig. 360, 362, 364–365 (referring to the Memento Mori in a private collection in Bergamo [NCMA canvas], whose pendant, the Gamblers, was in a private collection in Milan and inscribed DC).

Dipinti Antichi (auction catalogue), Asta 36, vol. 1 (Milan: Porro & C., May 9, 2007), lot 33, 48–49, as Memento mori by Giovanni Martinelli.

Francesca Baldassari, “Giovanni Martinelli,” in La Pittura del Seicento a Firenze: Indice degli Artisti e delle loro Opere (Robilant & Voena, 2009), 524–527, at 526 (listed under Giovanni Martinelli as with Galerie Sarti, Paris and previously at Porro & C., Milan).

Messina 2009a: Valeria Messina, Domenico Carpinoni, Pittori bergamaschi 11 (Bergamo: L’eco di Bergamo and Museo Bernareggi, 2009), illus. fig. XII (color), 56.

Messina 2009b: Valeria Messina, “La produzione di carattere profano: due "eccezionali" tele caravaggesche,” in Domenico Carpinoni (1566–1658): un artista rudolfino nel Seicento bergamasco (Clusone: Moma edizioni, 2009), 59–60.

Gianni Papi, “Giovanni Martinelli: La morte al banchetto,” in Caravaggio e caravaggeschi a Firenze (exhibition catalogue) (Florence: Giunti Sillabe, 2010), 302–303 (catalogue mention only, not in exhibition).

Claire Sarti, “Giovanni Martinelli: (1600/1604–1659),” in C’est la vie!: Vanités de Pompeii à Damien Hirst (exhibition catalogue) (Paris: Skira Flammarion, 2010), 42–43.

Alain R. Truong, “‘C'est la vie, Vanités de Caravage à Damien Hirst’ @ Fondation Dina Vierny - Musée Maillol,” Canalblog, February 4, 2010, https://www.alaintruong.com/archives/2010/02/04/16794853.html.

Gianni Papi, “Giovanni Martinelli, fra Artemisia e Vouet,” in Giovanni Martinelli da Montevarchi pittore in Firenze, Rossella Foggie, Carolina Rindi, eds. (Montevarchi: Aska, 2011), illus. fig. 1-4, 12 (color), 33–47.

Francesca Baldassari, “Monogrammist DCI: (Giovanni Martinelli?),” in Caravaggesque Italian Painters: Painters of Reality (exhibition catalogue) (Paris: Galerie G. Sarti, 2013), cat. no. 16, 134–143.
(n.b. Baldassari’s assertion that the painting now in the NCMA was once in Roberto Longhi’s [1890–1970] collection is incorrect. Baldassari confused the painting’s history with that of another painting that was in Longhi’s collection before the Second World War and disappeared around that time—a version of The Card Sharps [Partita a carte]. As confirmed by Paolo Benassai, Fondazione Longhi, letter to David Steel, November 11, 2013, Longhi never owned a painting depicting Death Comes to the Table. Because of this confusion, Baldassari failed to connect the NCMA painting with the Death Comes to the Table that was in a private collection in Bergamo by the mid- 1980s. Baldassari’s interpretation of certain secondary sources is likewise erroneous).

“A Conversation with Claudio Strinati: As Recorded by Frank Dabbell,” in Caravaggesque Italian Painters: Painters of Reality (exhibition catalogue) (Paris: Galerie G. Sarti, 2013), illus. fig. 16 (color), 21.

David Steel, “New and on View at the NCMA: Giovanni Martinelli, Memento Mori: Death Comes to the Table, circa 1630–38,” in Preview (Summer 2014), 14-15.

Domenico Carpinoni (1566-1658). Arte, fede e devozione popolare (exhibition catalogue), ed. Enrico De Pasquale (Bergamo: Lubrina Bramani, 2025), illustrated (catalogue mention only, not in exhibition).

Exhibition HistoryBergamo, IT, Palazzo della Ragione, "Il Seicento a Bergamo", September 26–November 29, 1987, cat. no. 68 (as Domenico Carpinoni; exhibited alongside presumed pendant, La partita a carte, private collection, Milan, of same dimensions).

Paris, Fondation Dina Vierny Musée Maillol, "C’est la vie! Vanités de Pompeii à Damien Hirst", February 3– June 28, 2010 (as Giovanni Martinelli).

Ajaccio, Corsica, Palais Fesch-Musée des Beaux-Arts, "Réflexion sur la mort", July 1–October 2, 2011 (as Giovanni Martinelli).

Paris, Galerie G. Sarti, "Peintres caravagesques italiens: peintres de la réalité", April 11–July 12, 2013, cat. no. 16. Object Rights Statement

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