MY IDENTIFICATION OF A SELF-PORTRAIT BY LORENZO LOTTO (1480 -1557) IN THE PREDELLA MARTINENGO AND OF A CONNECTED REBUS IN THE SAME PICTURE .By Maurizio Sorelli, Bergamo, Italy

AbstractI present my identification of a self-portrait as a Dominican Friar by the great venetian painter Lorenzo Lotto (1480-1557) in the well-known painting Saint Dominic reviving Napoleon Orsini (1516), at the Accademia Carrara di Belle Arti, Bergamo, Italy. I have also discovered a rebus connected with the self-portrait, in the same picture, which sends again to another rebus in another painting by Lotto, the Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine (1523), in the same picture Gallery. I propose my solutions for the two rebuses and present a few correlated questions (please see full article in Italian for further details) .

Hi Lorenzo, see you at the Accademia !If you are at the Accademia Carrara di Belle Arti in Bergamo, Italy, you will be able to look straight at Lorenzo Lotto's eyes . I had always been convinced that the look of the great painter of Venetian Renaissance was as his drawing Portrait of a bearded Man in the Uffizi, Florence, shows us : an honest face, with the eyes of an often ill-treated man . That morning in june 2007, at the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo I realized for the first time that in the well-known painting Saint Dominic reviving Napoleon Orsini, nephew of the Cardinal of Fossanova (1516) by Lorenzo Lotto, the Dominican Friar with the red book, observing us behind a Cardinal Bishop, in the picture, has the same face as the Bearded Man by Lotto, of the Uffizi Cabinet of Drawings , has . Searching for proofs about the reality of my identification , I noticed that Napoleon Orsini' s full cut mantle appears, in the picture, like a perfect O (O for Orsini ?) ; S. Dominic's contour looks like a D (D for Dominic) ; the profile of Cardinal Stephen Fossanova's body and train draws a S with a superimposed F (S and F for Stephen Fossanova) and the Friar' s arms look like two L's (for Lorenzo Lotto) . So, alphabetic letters are associated with some men, in that painting, by means of the initials of the first and/or last name of them . The Dignitary on the left, the only fellow with a striped suit (we know his name: Nicol Bonghi) shows his cloack on his left arm wrapped in a quite strange way : you see it forms a capital B, while

his body itself, hammered in place like a nail, suggests the letter I ; his triangular hat, furthermore, looks like a circumflex accent, used in Italy during Renaissance to contract written words: e.g. Rome instead of in Rome . Due to all these reasons, and considering that Lotto paints himself, in that picture, like an observing Dominican, the hidden phrase has, in my opinion, the following appearance : In B.. S... F... Domenicano Osservante Lorenzo Lotto . The Painter was in Bergamo, at that time (1516) , thus we have : In Bergamo S... F... Domenicano Osservante Lorenzo Lotto . If a Painter becomes a Friar, he takes the Orders (in italian : si fa frate. Simple Past: si fece). So, I propose the following solution for the rebus In Bergamo si fece Domenicano Osservante Lorenzo Lotto . English translation : In Bergamo became Dominican Observant Lorenzo Lotto , that is the scene painted in the picture ( 'fare', that is 'to make' , means 'to paint' in painters' jargon ) . Since Niccol Bonghi appears (once again hammered like a nail and with the same hat) also in the well-known Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine (1523) by Lotto (which is in the same room of the same Accademia in Bergamo) , it's therefore reasonable to guess the presence of another rebus in that painting . Bonghi, the donor of the painting = In ; The B for Bergamo is not there, but in the grey rectangle in the upper portion of the canvas there likely was, till 1528, a view of Bergamo ( of Mt. Sinai according to some scholars : unlikely, by virtue of these discoveries of mine ) which a French soldier stole, that year, during the occupation of the city . The angel on the right keeps his arms in the double L position : = Lorenzo Lotto . St. Catherine shows to have the same function of Cardinal Fossanova in the Predella Martinengo: = S + F . The Child's shape is specular with Catherine's upper one and therefore suggests another F . The Lady, lastly, recalls a big C to mind . Since many clients of Lotto, in the years 1522 - '25, followed franciscan doctrines (especially about the immaculate Conception of the Holy Virgin) , I propose the following solution for the rebus : In Bergamo Lorenzo Lotto si fece Francescano Conventuale . Translation : In Bergamo Lorenzo Lotto became Friar [Minor] Conventual . Many questions arise : why does Lotto declare himself belonging to those two mendicant Orders ? Why Friar Conventual instead of Observant ? Is he joking or he refers to serious programs and artistic choices ? In the Italian full version of this paper I try to answer these questions and a few others ( please see that PDF for the complete description of my discovery and further details ) . Copyright 2007 by MAURIZIO SORELLI - All Rights reserved