The Drawings of Michelangelo and His Followers in the Ashmolean Museum

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CATALOGUE 78 STUDIO DRAWINGS AND DRAWINGS OF UNDETERMINED STATUS 333

Raffaello’s control of his medium is less secure than

Michelangelo’s, he has succeeded in the present draw-

ings in reproducing something of the shell-like whorls of

his master’s modelling of knees.

Verso

Although the sprawling figures might have been intended

to form part of a battle scene, of which another part is to

be found on Cat. 77 , they are more probably related to a

project for a composition of theBrazen Serpent; there may

be a connection with two drawings that seem to represent

this subject by Antonio Mini, developing a theme from

Michelangelo, in Casa Buonarroti ( 37 F/B 170 ;red chalk,

203 × 248 mm, and 27 Averso/B 182 /Corpus 567 ;black

and red chalk, 407 × 562 mm). Superimposed on the sec-

ond of these Michelangelo has begun drawing a plan of

a fortification, one of several on which he was engaged

in15 2 9, which therefore provides aterminus ante quemfor

this design. Very similar figures also occur on the verso of

afamous drawing in the British Museum (W 57 /Corpus

220 ;black chalk, 388 × 247 mm) the recto of which is

theBearded Headin soft black chalk traditionally thought

to be a study for the head of Saint Bartholomew in the

Last Judgement,but convincingly reidentified by Wilde

as a study for the head of one of the two statues, of

Saints Cosmas and Damian, who flank the Madonna on

the Magnifici Tomb, executed by, respectively, Giovanni

Montorsoli and Raffaello da Montelupo. The verso of

the British Museum sheet contains two studies of sprawl-

ing figures in black chalk, which are probably by Antonio

Mini, and which are very similar to, if not identical with,

those on the present verso. Superimposed upon these are

four studies that Wilde tentatively attributes to Michelan-

gelo. The first of these, in black chalk, depicts a standing

figure from the front; two of the other three, all of which

are in red chalk, show a part of a torso and a raised right

arm. These last are reproduced, as Wilde again noted, in

Bonthe verso of the present sheet. This web of connec-

tions evokes once more the close relations that existed

among sheets used by Michelangelo, Antonio Mini, and

Raffaello da Montelupo in the late 15 2 0s and early

153 0s. D, indeed, might be after a diagrammatic sketch

byMini.

The chalk drawing at the lower left, B, shows the

torso and raised right arm of a man who seems about