EL GRECO (DomenicoTheotocopuli)
145 Saint John the Evangelist
and an Angel
Pen and pale brown ink and gray-brown wash on off-
white paper; H: 33.7 cm (i3I4in.); W: 21 cm (S^in.)
82.GA.l66
MARKS AND INSCRIPTIONS! None.
PROVENANCE: Mariano Fortuny, Rome; Tomas Harris,
London; Marc Farquhar Oliver, Jedburgh; art market,
New York.
EXHIBITIONS: Drawings by Old Masters, Saville Gallery,
London, 1929, no. 25 (catalogue by T. Borenius). Do-
menico Theotocopul, El Greco, Gazette des Beaux-Arts,
Paris, 1937, no. 40. Exhibition of Greek Art, Royal Acad-
emy of Arts, London, 1946, no. 353. Domenico Theoto-
copul, dit Le Greco, 1541-1614, Galerie des Beaux-Arts,
Bordeaux, 1953, no. 82. Timeless Master Drawings, Wil-
denstein Gallery, New York, 1955, no. 28.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: A. M. Hind, "El Greco," Old Master
Drawings 3, no. 10 (September 1928), pp. 29-30; F. Rut-
ter, El Greco 1541-1614 (London, 1930), pp. iio-m, no.
20; F.J. Sanchez Canton, Dibujos espagnoles (Madrid,
I93°) 5 vol. 2, no. 153; L. Goldscheider, El Greco (New
York, 1938), p. 24, no. 89; E. Gradmann, SpanischeMeis-
terzeichnung (Frankfurt am Main, 1939), p. 12, no. 3; E.
du Gue Trapier, "Notes on Spanish Drawings," Notes
Hispanic i (1941), p. 13; A. Bertram, El Greco (London,
1949), pi. 24; J. Camon Aznar, Dominico Greco (Madrid,
1950), vol. 2, pp. 1176 , 1396; J. G. Sicre, Spanish Draw-
ings XV-XIX Centuries (New York, London, and Paris,
1950), p. 29; F.J. Sanchez Canton, in I. Moskowitz, ed.,
Great Drawings of All Time (New York, 1962), vol. 4, no.
930; H. Wethey, El Greco and His School (Princeton,
1962), vol. 2, pp. 151-152; F.J. Sanchez Canton, Spanish
Drawings from the wth to the icjth Century (New York,
1964), pp. 20, 75; G. ManziniandT. Frati, L'opera completa
del Greco (Milan, 1969), p. 106; G. M. Smith et al., Span-
ish Baroque Drawings in North American Collections, exh.
cat., University of Kansas Museum of Art, Lawrence,
1974, PP- H? 2I? n- T5"> D. Angulo and A. E. Perez San-
chez, A Corpus of Spanish Drawings, 1400-1600, vol. i
(London, 1975), p. 44, no. 160; T. Yoshikawa, El Greco,
L'art du monde, no. 14 (Tokyo, 1976), p. 100; J. Brown,"Review of D. Angulo and A. E. Perez Sanchez, A Cor-
pus of Spanish Drawings, 1400-1600," Master Drawings 14 ,
no. 2 (Summer 1976), p. 179; T. Crombie, "Review of
D. Angulo and A. E. Perez Sanchez, A Corpus of Spanish
Drawings, 1400-1600," Apollo 103, no. 167 (January
1976), p. 74.ALTHOUGH EL GRECO APPEARS TO HAVE BEEN AN
active draughtsman whose estate included at least 150
drawings, only a small handful survives (Wethey 1962,
vol. 2, p. 151). An early drawing, Day (Munich, Staat-
liche Graphische Sammlung), Saint John the Evangelist
(Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional; Wethey 1962, figs. 349,
351), and this drawing are the only ones accepted without
serious doubt as by El Greco. The Museum's drawing
was first published by Hind (1928, pp. 29-30), who rec-
ognized it as a preparatory study for the Crucifixion in the
Prado, Madrid (Wethey 1962, vol. 2, no. 75), of circa- The pose and basic pattern of drapery folds is es-
tablished in the drawing, as is the rich interplay of light
and dark. The latter quality, as Hind already noted, is still
more vivid in the drawing than the painting. The angel
is very freely sketched and contains several pentimenti.
Nevertheless certain details such as the billowing lower
drapery reappear in the Prado picture. Given these clear
connections, there is every reason to consider the draw-
ing as a study for the Prado painting rather than a rep-
resentation of Saint Matthew with an -angel, as has oc-
casionally been proposed (Sanchez Canton 1930, vol. 2,
no. 153). The technique employed here consists of long
and rather free lines creating rich patterns of form whose
resonance results from broadly applied wash.^1 The veils
of form and light find their parallels in the artist's late
paintings.
i. There are several horizontal creases in the lower portion of
the sheet. These were present before the drawing was made, as
was pointed out by Alexander Yow (Record of examination
and treatment, November 23, 1982).322 SPANISH SCHOOL • EL GRECO