The Drawings of Michelangelo and His Followers in the Ashmolean Museum

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0521551335 c 06 CUNY 160 /Joannides 052155 133 1 January 11 , 2007 11 : 50

CATALOGUE 87 COPIES AFTER PAINTINGS 351

or, more probably, the Pauline Chapel frescoes, but

any connection is one of style rather than motif: The

compiler cannot find these forms in any of the three

frescoes in question or among the surviving prepara-

tory drawings for them. Nevertheless, such links, if this

observation is correct, would suggest a dating within

the period155 0– 60 .The hatching at the rear of the

thigh is coarse in its application, and falls below the

standard of draughtsmanship seen elsewhere in this

drawing.

The verso drawing, made with the sheet orientated

horizontally, has been drastically trimmed at top and bot-

tom to frame the recto image, losing both the head and the

feet of this figure. It depicts a lightly winged nude infant,

holding out a shield with his right arm in an attitude of

defence. The figure may have found a place within some

allegorical representation of a conflict between chaste and

sensual love.

The drawings on this sheet are of quite high quality,

densely and solidly modelled. They are probably by a

Florentine artist in the circle of Bronzino, whose work

after 155 0 washeavily influenced by Michelangelo’s

Pauline Chapel phase. The compiler is unable to propose

aspecific name with any confidence, although he would

reject that of Alessandro Allori, in many ways the most

obvious candidate; he is, however, attracted by Dr. Julian

Brooks’ suggestion (personal communication) of Maso da

San Friano.