Nicholas Hall

Nicholas Hall We are an art gallery specializing in Old Master paintings. Discover 700 years of European art to buy and sell.

With over 40 years of experience in sourcing and selling some of the finest Old Master paintings, sculpture and drawings on the market, Nicholas Hall is among the most trusted and reputable dealers of classical European art. Privacy and discretion is paramount to our business and our appointment-only modus operandi gives you the confidence to sell, maintain and grow your collction with us.

The eccentric, restless energy of the Emilian artist Lelio Orsi (1511—1587) is evident in this detail depicting ‘Leda an...
01/15/2025

The eccentric, restless energy of the Emilian artist Lelio Orsi (1511—1587) is evident in this detail depicting ‘Leda and the Swan’. For two centuries this important sheet belonged to the family of the Swedish physician Dr. Johan Jacob Ekman, a great friend of the Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770–1844) in Rome, where the two “drew in each other’s pedigree books and assembled an art collection.” It is one one of 36 drawings coming to our gallery, presented by W.M. Brady & Co., for the upcoming . Come and see us from 31 Jan to 8 February!

01/09/2025
It is with great excitement that we announce the acquisition of Salvator Rosa’s La Strega from our gallery by the  Flore...
01/06/2025

It is with great excitement that we announce the acquisition of Salvator Rosa’s La Strega from our gallery by the Florence — a return to the city where she was painted in the late 1640s.

Coincidentally, children in Italy would have woken up this morning with stockings filled by La Befana, a folkloric witch-like figure, as they celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany today.

Ringing in the Jubilee Year of 2025 in the Eternal City — with a pilgrimage to the Quirinale Guercino show for the most ...
01/04/2025

Ringing in the Jubilee Year of 2025 in the Eternal City — with a pilgrimage to the Quirinale Guercino show for the most breathtaking view of St Peters, and the obsessive quest for beauty wherever you go.

Guercino’s Samson Captured by the Philistines is a sensational piece of storytelling and one of the greatest Baroque pic...
12/09/2024

Guercino’s Samson Captured by the Philistines is a sensational piece of storytelling and one of the greatest Baroque pictures in the Met. Curiously, before it came to New York in the 1970s, the painting had spent half a century in the Sursock family collection in Beirut.

Responding to the moment of existential crisis evoked in this Baroque masterpiece, artist Tom Young recently shared with us fond memories of his visits to the Sursock Palace and other monuments of historic importance in Lebanon—a country where he has lived for the last 15 years until the end of October. Editing this piece has kept us busy for the last few weeks, along with preparations for our next exhibition, soon to be announced. Follow the link in our bio to read on.

Why does Dorothea Tanning’s family patriarch from 1953 look eerily familiar? The monstrosities of the world that precipi...
11/07/2024

Why does Dorothea Tanning’s family patriarch from 1953 look eerily familiar? The monstrosities of the world that precipitated and sustained the Surrealist movement are, perhaps alarmingly, not that far off from the political predicaments we find ourselves in today.

In the spiraling labyrinth of the Pompidou’s Surrealist centenary exhibition, I was struck by the loneliness of Caspar David Friedrich’s landscape and the verve of Victor Hugo’s ‘automatic’ drawing, as Max Ernst and André Breton would have been too. From these earlier examples to works created in the last two decades, the retrospective carried a progressively egalitarian message: Surrealism was not an exclusive club for a few familiar men, but opened its arms to women and ‘foreigners’ from Bucharest to Buenos Aires. Alongside some of the most iconic Surrealist masterpieces, I was heartened to see that a work previously in our collection, Eileen Agar’s 1936 sculpture made of shells, feathers, rocks and other objects gathered in Dorset, was installed in a climactic spot with arguably the best view.

It is humbling to be surrounded by these monumental frescoes from the 1370s and 80s by Altichiero da Zevio, one of the m...
10/25/2024

It is humbling to be surrounded by these monumental frescoes from the 1370s and 80s by Altichiero da Zevio, one of the most important trecento artists from Northern Italy. During our visit this summer, we found it especially moving to witness a young custodian practising baroque violin sonatas in the empty Oratory of St. George, covered from wall to wall in Altichiero’s frescoes.

Altichiero was one of few artists tasked with the creation of fresco cycles across multiple building complexes in the center of Padua over the course of the 14th century, which included Giotto’s ground-breaking work for the Scrovegni Chapel. The unique and extraordinary existence of this ‘Padova Urbs Picta’ (Painted City of Padua) attests to a decisive moment in art history: when Italian painting broke away from the earlier Byzantine model practised by Duccio and Cimabue in Siena and Florence, the innovative impetus originating with Giotto and his disciples in the Veneto resulted in new possibilities of perspective, volume and texture, and also the authentic portrayal of human emotions. A visual parallel to the writing of Petrarch, if you may, whose portrait Altichiero included in one of his frescoes in the Oratory of St. George.

We are thrilled to have facilitated the latest acquisition at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford of a Crucifixion, attributed to the young Altichiero, or in the very least, an artist who provides a critical link between him and Giotto. Painted in the Veneto around 1350, it is the first trecento painting to be acquired by America’s oldest public museum in 70 years.

At once a fool and a madman, there is no English equivalent to ‘Le Fou’ – the title of the  ‘s expansive new exhibition....
10/22/2024

At once a fool and a madman, there is no English equivalent to ‘Le Fou’ – the title of the ‘s expansive new exhibition. Largely drawing from works of the 15th and 16th centuries, it explores the richness of this double-edged concept, venturing beyond the satirical Boschian fantasies and early ideas of insanity. ‘Le Fou’ lost its appeal during the Age of Enlightenment but re-emerged, with the birth of Romanticism and modern psychiatry, as something much more sombre, frightening and tragic. Messerschmidt, Goya, Gericault and unexpectedly, Dr. Gachet (sketch of Baudelaire’s mistress) are but a few examples. Following projections of Rigoletto and an early film adaptation of the ‘Hunchback of Notre Dame’, the powerful finale to the exhibition is the tortured ‘The Man Made Mad with Fear’, a self-portrait by Courbet wearing a jester’s jerkin.

Salvator Rosa’s La Strega on view at  until 8pm tonight. The existence of a related drawing, preserved in the  (detail a...
10/06/2024

Salvator Rosa’s La Strega on view at until 8pm tonight. The existence of a related drawing, preserved in the (detail above) shows the strega among men who are believed to be undertakers of the artist’s dead baby hence connecting our picture with this devastating personal tragedy.

A charismatic family friend who modelled for Marlboro on the side, Stella Rudolph was a formidable font of knowledge on ...
09/29/2024

A charismatic family friend who modelled for Marlboro on the side, Stella Rudolph was a formidable font of knowledge on Baroque and Neoclassical art who I admired long before my first cigarette. Photographed here by Sarah Quill with my father, who likewise belonged to a small circle of Anglo-American art world expats living in Italy, Stella moved to Florence soon after the flood of 1966 and stayed here until her death in 2020. For decades she gathered notes and photos for her long-awaited catalogue raisonne on Carlo Maratti but, surprisingly, her essay for our 2016 Maratti catalogue was one of few published writings by her on the artist. Finally, after four years of labour by Simonetta Prosperi, Stella’s monograph was just published by Ugo Bozzi. She would have been proud!

Traversing the ‘precipices, mountains, torrents, wolves, rumblings’ of the Alps and living amongst the bandits he was fa...
09/24/2024

Traversing the ‘precipices, mountains, torrents, wolves, rumblings’ of the Alps and living amongst the bandits he was famous for painting, Salvator Rosa is perhaps the ultimate enigmatic, erudite ‘tortured artist’. This Romantic vision was as much his own doing as the fabled writings of Horace Walpole and Lady Morgan.

It was during Rosa’s stay in Florence between 1640-49 that he established an early reputation for single-figure paintings of poets, philosophers and self-portraits, as well as depictions of witchcraft — both in writing and in paint. We are thrilled to have published in print Rosa’s 1645 poem La Strega (1645) which was translated in full into English for the first time by Hannah Segrave. A small number of copies will be available at our stand at , opening to the public this Saturday.


Photo: detail from Salvator Rosa, The Dream of Aeneas, 1660-65,

The representation of female old age is anything but boring or predictable. Prompted by the brief reunification of the U...
09/20/2024

The representation of female old age is anything but boring or predictable. Prompted by the brief reunification of the Ugly Duchess and her more conventional husband, who flew in from New York (now his permanent residence), the held a small exhibition last year that explored this underlying theme. A few works of the same period were chosen to accompany the ill-matched couple. Most unexpected for me was the pairing of a satirical maiolica bust of a ‘belle donne’ with a richly patinated statuette of a seated old lady, carved in pearwood. Barely the size of a hand, all her folds, protrusions and hairs are there.

In two weeks’ time we will return to the Palazzo Corsini, Florence for the  (BIAF) with a special presentation of a sing...
09/13/2024

In two weeks’ time we will return to the Palazzo Corsini, Florence for the (BIAF) with a special presentation of a single work by Salvator Rosa (1615–1673), La Strega.

Famously featured in Umberto Eco’s 2007 study, On Ugliness, the majestic canvas, towering over 2 meters tall, is by far the largest of Rosa’s paintings of witches and is executed with a vigor that separates it from his other stregonerie––many of which were painted for Florentine patrons, including Bartolomeo Corsini whose multi-figural witch scene remains on view in the Palace where we are exhibiting. Hope to see you there!

NICHOLAS HALL
La Biennale Internazionale
dell’Antiquariato di Firenze (BIAF) 2024
Stand D

Palazzo Corsini
Lungarno Corsini 10, Florence
Italy

Public Hours
28 September – 6 October 2024
10:30–20:00 daily

Who is this hairy-faced soldier and why did Rosso Fiorentino paint him? Has Rosso inserted a portrait of his pet baboon ...
08/20/2024

Who is this hairy-faced soldier and why did Rosso Fiorentino paint him? Has Rosso inserted a portrait of his pet baboon “Bertaccione”? Could it be man with a rare medical condition that causes excessive hair growth on his face? Or is it the artist’s reaction to recent events in Rome during which he was captured and tortured?

The palette is unusually dark for the artist, which matches the Evangelist’s description of the eclipse the day of the Crucifixion but also hints at the horrors of the Sack of Rome which had occurred only a year before. Tucked away in the tiny church of San Lorenzo in Borgo San Sepolcro, Rosso’s Deposition is a complex, sustained masterpiece and a surprise for those following the Piero della Francesca trail.

In the 1970s a lunatic set Pietro Lorenzetti’s Tarlati polyptych on fire by placing two candles on the back; luckily the...
08/16/2024

In the 1970s a lunatic set Pietro Lorenzetti’s Tarlati polyptych on fire by placing two candles on the back; luckily the damage was localized. It was not until 2014 that the polyptych underwent further conservation treatment and now it is once again glistening on the high altar of the Santa Maria della Pieve. Commissioned for the church by the Bishop of Arezzo in 1320, it is Pietro’s first documented work; subsequently he almost exclusively in Siena even if his most famous works are his frescoes in Assisi. His delicate elegance shows his debt to Simone Martini. What is exceptionally memorable for me is the sumptuous ermine-lined robe of the Madonna and St John’s luxurious coat of camel hair under the iridescent tunic.

Dispatch from Sydney // Juan de Zurbarán’s still life with a pear and apples on display in its new home at the Art Galle...
07/23/2024

Dispatch from Sydney // Juan de Zurbarán’s still life with a pear and apples on display in its new home at the Art Gallery of New South Wales – a distinguished collection that has just celebrated its 200th anniversary with the purchase of another Spanish Baroque painting, Ribera’s Aesop (to the right of the easel) from our gallery – although this time our partner Patrick Matthiesen was on the negotiation end. Admittedly it is a bitter–sweet feeling that one fewer painting by this incredibly rare talent is ever to come on the market – but at least one knows where to find it any day!

This intimate watercolor of chestnuts and bread by Jan Augustin van der Goes was acquired only last year by the noted co...
07/19/2024

This intimate watercolor of chestnuts and bread by Jan Augustin van der Goes was acquired only last year by the noted collector of Northern drawings, ‘Chips’ Moore. It is in an exhibition of some of his and his wife‘s promised gifts to the — a sequel to the “Rembrandt school’ exhibition 12 years ago consisting primarily of works bought since. The humble simplicity of this oval parchment recalls the work, often executed on paper, by his better-known Dutch contemporary Adriaen Coorte, active just one hour to the north-east of van der Goes‘s native Antwerp.

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