The Old Master and British Paintings Evening Sale will take place at Sotheby’s on 7 December 2011 at 07.00pm. The seven Pullicino views are Lot 35 and The Property of a Gentleman. They were probably commissioned or acquired by Robert Clements, 1st Earl of Leitrim(1732-1804).

The estimated price is 200,000-300,000 GBP. They are mentioned in Mary, 2nd Countess of Leitrim, ms. Inventory of Pictures etc. at Killadoon, 27 June 2836; ‘Inside Hall. Seven Views of Malta in Gilt Frames’.

According to a Catalogue Note this is the largest and most complete set of views of the island and harbours of Malta to have survived from the eighteenth century and the only such set to have remained together since its acquisition or commission. … An additional small group of four views is recorded as formerly from the Sant Fournier collection in Malta is now in a private collection. …The fullest analysis and juxtaposition of these groups was published by David Boswell in the same year. In contrast to the relatively large numbers of vedute of Naples, Rome or Venice, views of Malta in the eighteenth century were, and remain, of the greatest rarity. The island was then under the sovereignty of the Order of the Knights of St John, and would remain so until the arrival of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1798 and his subsequent displacement by the British. The journey there was a long and difficult one and few Grand Tourists made the trip. Among those who did were John, 4th Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792) and his friend William Ponsonby, later 2nd Earl of Bessborough, accompanied by the Swiss painter Jean-Etienne Liotard, who made the trip in 1738, and William Young (1749-1815) whose own journey took place in 1772.

As Boswell observes the key painting in these groups is that in the ex-Valls group which depicts Valletta from the entry to its two main harbours – unique among all the known sets – which is inscribed and dated on the reverse: Veue (sic) de lentree du grand port/de malte peinte d’apres nature/en aout 1749 par alberto pullicino/pour le chevalier turgot.

This allows us to identify the painter as Alberto Pullicino, a relatively obscure native of Valletta, whose principal patrons were the Order of the Knights of Saint John in Malta, for whom he worked in the 1750s in a mainly decorative vein for the convent church of St John in Valletta. His son Giorgio (1779-1851) was also a view painter, but gained a greater reputation as an architect. The ‘Chevalier Turgot’ was the Frenchman, Etienne François Turgot de Brucourt (1721-1789), the son of a royal counsellor, who was in Malta between 1746 and 1760 for his enrolment into the Order of the Knights of Saint John.

In views such as this, Pullicino broke completely with the prevailing tradition of elaborate and decorative birds-eye panoramic views of the island established in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries and continued by the well-known gouache views painted by Joseph Goupy (fl.1711-63). As the inscription on Turgot’s picture testifies, Pullicino’s works were painted direct from nature, taken at eye level and from specific viewpoints, most of which can still be identified today.

(DUE TO LACK OF SPACE THIS INTERESTING CATALOGUE NOTE HAS HAD TO BE CONDENSED)

From: The International Dictionary of Artists who Painted Malta by Nicholas De Piro. 1988

PULLICINO, or PULICINO, Alberto (Maltese) fl. 1749

Painter of harbour views. He worked in oils and sometimes produced pictures in sets of four or five. He may have been popular with the French knights as some of his pictures have come from France. It has been useful to be able to attribute pictures to this artist, and the reason this is possible is that a set of four views purchased by Le Chevalier Turgot in August 1749 is clearly inscribed “Veue (sic) de L’entrée du Grand Porte du Malte peinte (sic) d’apres nature en Aout 1749 par Alberto Pulicino (sic) pour Le Chevalier Turgot”.

The Chevalier Turgot (Etienne-François) was responsible for the colonization of Guyana and under his government its backing of the King of France. However, Grand Master Pinto withdrew his support for the scheme and the project was dissolved. Chevalier Turgot left the colony in 1764 and spent a year at Cayenne during which time he became ill.

He returned to France and became a recluse and died shortly afterwards. It is possible that the large picture attributed to Giuseppe Guerra at the Wallace Collection is in fact by Pullicino. It is certainly by the same artist who painted the three pictures at the Valletta Borsa. Other Malta harbour views attributed by Sotheby’s to Tomas Ruiz (19th March 1975) are perhaps by Pullicino.

All Goupy oils (if there are any) and Bardi prints will have to be re-assessed or, at least, come under close scrutiny.