P 1 : KsF
0521551331 c 01 -p 2 CUNY 160 /Joannides 052155 133 1 January 11 , 2007 10 : 5
172 WHOLLY OR PARTIALLY AUTOGRAPH SHEETS CATALOGUE 30Verso
The sketch of a rider recalls motifs generated by
Michelangelo for theBattle of Cascina;whyhe should
have reprised aspects of that scheme at this date is con-
jectural. However, if the vase below the horse’s front legs
is connected, then, as suggested previously, it may have
been a design for some small decorative piece in bronze,
perhaps an inkwell; around the same time Michelangelo
made a drawing for a bronze hanging lamp on the recto of
a sheet now in the Fogg Art Museum ( 1932 - 15 2/Corpus
438 ;black chalk,15 7×15 6mm).
The winged female head [K] is similar in reverse to a
head by Michelangelo on a truncated sheet in the Uffizi
( 251 Fverso/B 243 ;red chalk, 279 × 133 mm; this side of
the sheet also carries some drawings apparently by Mini).
The recto of this sheet, in which Michelangelo has com-
bined red and black chalk, shows a standingVenusand
wasprobably made in preparation for a now-lost presen-
tation drawing known only in a later copy by Salviati,
also in the Uffizi ( 14673 F; red chalk, 355 × 243 mm). The
winged head – identified by Frey as that of Mercury but
byThode simply as an imaginary form – might conjec-
turally be related to one of the standing allegories to be
placed on either side of the seated dukes in the New
Sacristy. However one would generally associate wings
with the element of air, and even though this would
be appropriate to one of the two figures flanking Duke
Giuliano, representingHeavenandEarth, neither of them
as shown on Michelangelo’smodellofor that tomb (Paris,
Louvre, Inv. 838 /J 27 /Corpus 186 )wears a winged head-
dress. The identities of the pair planned to flank Lorenzo
are not known, but it is possible that one of them could
have worn a winged headdress; however, their most likely
identities areFireandWater, and wings would not have
been appropriate for either.
The head in profile with an Amerindian-style head-
dress is difficult to account for, but it may be simply
one of Michelangelo’s experimental coiffures, a genre in
which he was exceptionally inventive. The sketches of a
grasshopper and a crab are also hard to explain, but a crab is
represented in Michelangelo’s later presentation drawing
ofTityusat Windsor (PW 429 /Corpus 345 ;black chalk,
190 × 330 mm), and he may have considered employing
crustacean and insect forms in headdresses for hisIdeal
Heads–nosurviving drawing by him demonstrates such
a use, but at least one of theIdeal HeadsbyJacomo Ligozzi
includes a locust (Paris, Louvre, Inv. 1704 ), and the idea
may have originated with Michelangelo. The relation of
the diagrammatic skull to those on the verso of Uffizi
598 E, one of the sheets given to Gherardo Perini, sug-
gests their probable contemporaneity.The poem is dated c.153 0byGirardi and others, but
given its priority over the drawings, it must be of c. 1525
or even a little earlier. The emphasis on a struggle between
death and the soul was to bear fruit in the lower areas of the
Last Judgement, and this connection may have suggested
the later dating. The mood of depression, if not despair,
seems more appropriate to a man older than about fifty,
and one who was, in fact, to live almost another forty
years; but Michelangelo complained about his waning
strength on more than one occasion during the15 2 0s and
he was, in any case, always liable to depressions. In the
present case, his mood may have been exacerbated by his
anxiety over theHercules and Antaeus, and his work on the
tombs in the New Sacristy would naturally have focused
his mind on the inevitability – and proximity – of death.
The watermark found on the present sheet also occurs
on Cats. 35 and 42 ,asRobinson noted.Drawn Copies
c.15 8 0Andrea Commodi copied:
Donthe recto on Uffizi 18609 Fverso.
Fonthe verso on Uffizi186 0 9Frecto.
Honthe verso on Uffizi 18608 Frecto.
Monthe verso on Uffizi 18609 Frecto.History
Casa Buonarroti, by c. 15 8 0?; Jean-Baptiste Wicar?;
William Young Ottley, his sale, 6 June 1814 and days
following, lot 1760 ; (“One – a leaf of masterly studies
in red chalk; Hercules and Antaeus, etc. on both sides
with one of his poems autograph.most interesting.
This poem is copied in facsimile in Mr Duppa’s Life
of Michael Angelo.” £ 33. 12. 0 ); Sir Thomas Lawrence
(L. 2445 ); Samuel Woodburn.References
Ottley sale, 6 June 1814 etc., lot 1760 (“One – a leaf
of masterly studies in red chalk; Hercules and Antaeus,
etc. on both sides with one of his poems autograph.
most interesting. This poem is copied in facsimile
in Mr Duppa’s Life of Michael Angelo.”). Woodburn,
184 2,no. 9 (“This study appears to have been a les-
son for a pupil.”). Guasti, 1863 ,pp.34 7– 9 (Transcrip-
tion of poem.). Robinson,187 0,no. 45 (Michel Angelo.
Recto: “Two sketches of a group, evidently for sculpture
in the round, of Hercules strangling Antaeus, the design
nearly similar but seen from two rather different points of
view; perhaps this is a sketch taken from a wax model
byhimself...they are apparently connected with the
lines of a diagram which seems to indicate some problem