The two paintings above depicting the biblical story of the temptation of Eve were probably made to be set within the wall paneling of a Florentine bedroom. Eve takes fruit from the forbidden tree of knowledge and passes it to Adam, disobeying God’s orders. He gives in to the temptations of a serpent with a head that resembles Eve’s, a device used in Christian art to emphasize their similarities as sinful seducers. Bugiardini painted several comparable oblong nude figures for similar settings, but more typically the figures are taken from classical history or myth.
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Eve (1971.115.3a)
Adam (1971.115.3b)
Fig. 1. Framed together
Artwork Details
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Title:Adam; Eve
Artist:Giuliano di Piero di Simone Bugiardini (Italian, Florence 1475–1554 Florence)
Date:ca. 1520
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:Each 26 3/8 x 61 3/4 in. (67 x 156.8 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Bequest of Edward Fowles, 1971
Object Number:1971.115.3ab
Lucien Cottreau, Paris (until 1938; sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, November 1938 or private sale to Duveen); [Duveen, Paris and New York, 1938–at least 1964, as by Piero di Cosimo; transferred to Fowles, partner in the firm]; Edward Fowles, New York (by 1969–d. 1971, as attributed to Piero di Cosimo)
Baltimore Museum of Art. "Bacchiacca and His Friends," January 10–February 19, 1961, no. 22 (as "Eve's Temptation of Adam," by Piero di Cosimo, lent by Duveen Brothers, Inc.).
Rochester, N.Y. Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester. "Renaissance Vignettes," February–March 1964, no catalogue?
Lionello Venturi. Letter. August 3, [1939?], attributes these two paintings to Piero di Cosimo.
Robert Langton Douglas. "The Fall of Man by Piero di Cosimo." Burlington Magazine 86 (June 1945), pp. 134–39, pl. I (overall and details), dates them 1500 or soon after, and notes that another critic has ascribed them to Bugiardini.
Robert Langton Douglas. "The Fall of Man by Piero di Cosimo: A Postscript." Burlington Magazine 87 (September 1945), p. 233.
Robert Langton Douglas. Piero di Cosimo. Chicago, 1946, pp. 64–71, 77, 114, pls. XLVI–II (overall and detail), as in a private collection, New York.
Paola Morselli. "Ragioni di un pittore fiorentino: Piero di Cosimo (continua)." L'arte, n.s., 56 (July–December 1957), p. 144, concurs with the attribution to Piero di Cosimo.
Paola Morselli. "Piero di Cosimo, saggio di un catalogo delle opere." L'arte, n.s., 57 (January–March 1958), p. 82.
Bernard Berenson. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Florentine School. London, 1963, vol. 1, p. 45; vol. 2, pl. 1262 (detail), attributes them to Bugiardini.
Mina Bacci. Piero di Cosimo. Milan, 1966, p. 124, pl. 67 (overall and details), lists them, under works erroneously attributed to Piero di Cosimo, as more probably by Bugiardini, and compares them with Bugiardini's paintings of Leda (Treccani collection, Milan) and Venus (private collection, Florence).
S[ilvia]. Meloni Trkulja inDizionario biografico degli italiani. Vol. 15, Rome, 1972, p. 17, attributes them to Bugiardini and calls them late works.
Laura Pagnotta. Giuliano Bugiardini. Turin, 1987, pp. 10, 19, 57, 215–16, no. 53, figs. 53, 53a–b (overall and details), as by Bugiardini, most probably from 1526–28, immediately following his trip to Bologna and possibly influenced by works of Perino del Vaga in Florence.
Laura Pagnotta. "Due dipinti e un disegno di Giuliano Bugiardini." Antichità viva 31, no. 2 (1992), pp. 13–14, states that a painting of an allegorical figure (private collection, Switzerland) was attributed to Bugiardini by Mina Bacci and Everett Fahy on the basis of its stylistic affinities with these paintings.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 33, ill.
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