Audiface Diotallevi e Gustav Friedrich Waagen: il carteggio per l’acquisto della Madonna di Raffaello e della Natività di Luini per il museo di Berlino (1841–1842)

The archive of the Diotallevi family preserves a folder of unpublished letters concerning the purchase of the so-called Diotallevi Madonna by Raphael and a Nativity by Bernardino Luini for the Berlin Gemäldegalerie, which in the Diotallevi collection had been misattributed to Perugino and Garofalo, respectively. The correspondence between the art collector Audiface Diotallevi and Gustav Friedrich Waagen, director of the Berlin museum, documents protracted negotiations during which both buyer and seller politely bargained for advantage. Whilst Diotallevi was keen to bolster the reputation of his collection by the prestigious sale of the two paintings to the Berlin museum, Waagen did his best not to reveal his belief in Raphael’s authorship of the Diotallevi Madonna. The two paintings, reserved for Waagen since December 1841, eventually left Rimini in April 1842, and were sent to Berlin via Rome.