The Drawings of Michelangelo and His Followers in the Ashmolean Museum

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CATALOGUE 45 WHOLLY OR PARTIALLY AUTOGRAPH SHEETS 221

CATALOGUE 45

Recto: Two Studies of a Bending Nude Male Figure

Ve r so: Two Studies of the Legs of a Bending Nude Male

Figure

184 6. 84 ;R. 70 ( 3 ); P.II 338 ; Corpus36 9

Dimensions: 115 × 110 mm

Medium

Black chalk.

Condition

The edges are particularly creased and bruised; there are

some tide marks, much skinning, some abrasions, small

indentations, a shallow diagonal score line, and a repaired

hole. There is overall uneven discolouration and edge

staining.

Inscriptions

Recto: In pen and grey ink at lower left:Mic: Ango:

Buonaroti.

Similar inscriptions are found on Cats. 47 , 48 , and

50 , and on a study for theLast Judgementin the British

Museum, W 60 recto/Corpus35 0; the provenance of all

these drawings is from the Cicciaporci Collection, and

this kind of inscription seems exclusive to it.

Irregular numbering:no. 77in pen and ink above right.

Ve r so: Robinson’s numbering in graphite upper centre: 3

and lower centre: 70

30

Lower left in graphite, Parker’s number: 338.

Discussion

Made by Michelangelo for Daniele da Volterra, in prepa-

ration for the latter’s painting ofSaint John the Baptist in

the Wilderness(called by VasariSan Giovanni in penitenza),

executed for their common friend, Giovanni della Casa.

Ve r sions of identical size, presumably made from the same

cartoon, survive in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich, Inv.

38 (oil on panel, 191 ×13 0 cm) and in the Capitoline

Museum in Rome, Inv.36 0 (oil on canvas, 190 ×13 0

cm). Both are rejected by Barolsky, no. 18 ,butTreves

( 2001 ) believes the Capitoline painting to be autograph.