La Mandolinata

Alternately titled: The Mandolin Player

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

General Description

Date: 1869
Model: Unknown

Bibliography

◦ Marillier, DGR: An Illustrated Memorial, 155.

◦ WMR, DGR as Designer and Writer, 284.

◦ Surtees, A Catalogue Raisonné, vol. 1, 121.

Scholarly Commentary

Introduction

The picture is one of many executed by DGR in which a woman is pictured playing a musical instrument. The earliest of these, The Blue Bower, dates from 1865, while the latest—Forced Music—was done in 1877.

Although Surtees questions the validity of the attribution to DGR, the picture is genuine.

Production History

The picture was done sometime in mid-1869, for it is one of two—mentioned by DGR in a letter to Shields—that he sold to Agnew. “At this moment I hear from London that Agnew has called & bought 2 chalk drawings I left to be shown to him for 80gns each. If he will go on, this will furnish some profitable pot-boiling; & I tell you, as you were the first to suggest a connection with him” ( Fredeman, Correspondence IV. 254 ). The dealer kept the picture in stock and later (March 1872) sold it to John Dearman Birchall, from Leeds.

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