The Drawings of Michelangelo and His Followers in the Ashmolean Museum

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0521551335 int 1 CUNY 160 /Joannides 052155 133 1 January 11 , 2007 9 : 28

12 THE DRAWINGS OF MICHELANGELO AND HIS FOLLOWERS IN THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM

Dream of Human Life,one of Michelangelo’s most famous

and spectacular drawings, he would have failed to men-

tion it. One might therefore be tempted to suggest that

Ottley had purchased these drawings from Wicar at some

date subsequent to 1800. Although there is no record that

Wicar ever visited England, and although Ottley is not

known to have returned to Italy – although he did go to

France – purchase by correspondence is quite possible, as

Lawrence’s example amply demonstrates.

However, the situation is complicated further by

another body of evidence, the drawings attributed to

Michelangelo that appeared in William Young Ottley’s

sales. Four auctions have been identified, taking place

in18 03, 1804 , 1807 , and 1814.^88 The information their

catalogues provide is patchy: Descriptions are perfunc-

tory, many lots contained more than one drawing,

and it is often unclear whether references to medium,

provenance, and even authorship apply to all the items in

multiple lots or only to one or two of them. Nevertheless,

despite such limitations, the catalogues are an invaluable

source, especially if what they say can be correlated with

information from other sources, including Ottley’sItalian

School of Design.

Ottley’s first sale, beginning on 14 April18 03, con-

tained ten lots under the name of Michelangelo, compris-

ing twenty-one drawings in total. Of these, one single-

drawing lot (no. 26 )was stated to be after Michelangelo;

another drawing – or possibly all three – in a three-

drawing lot (no. 19 )was given to Marcello Venusti; and

a further two items in a four-drawing lot (no. 27 )were

attributed to Kent, presumably William Kent, the British

painter-architect who trained in Rome for several years

at the beginning of the eighteenth century, rather than

the dealer of the same name, active later in the century.

These last two drawings are the only ones listed under

Michelangelo’s name in this sale that can today be

identified with some confidence.^89 One single-drawing

lot (no. 22 )isspecifically stated to have come from Sir

Peter Lely’s collection; another (lot 23 ), from that of

Thomas Hudson. It seems likely that the whole of lot 27 ,

in which William Kent’s two drawings were included,

with now-lost inscriptions on their versos taken from

Richardson and Wright, also came from English collec-

tions. One other, lot 26 –ifitiscorrectly identified as

the copy once in the Koenigs collection and now in the

Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, by Carlo Dolci, after

Michelangelo’s portrait drawing of Andrea Quaratesi –

wasprobably acquired by Ottley on the London market;

it bears Reynolds’ stamp, and no doubt appeared in one of

his posthumous sales, probably that of 1798 .Itisunlikely

that any one of the drawings offered in18 03had a recent

Italian provenance or was an autograph work by Miche-

langelo. Indeed, Gere suggested that Ottley did not own

the contents of this sale, but only acted as the expert.^90

Ottley’s second sale, begining on 11 April 1804 ,was

larger and richer. Sixteen lots were included under

Michelangelo’s name, comprising sixty-two drawings in

total. Six lots comprising twenty-five drawings are listed

either as coming “from the family of the artist, still res-

ident in Florence” or “from the Buonarroti collection.”

One of these, lot 275 ,containing two drawings, reap-

peared in Ottley’s 1814 sale as lot15 0 4, and this time

the provenance was given as Cicciaporci, which is more

likely to be correct. It is not fully clear how many draw-

ings contained in the remaining five ex-Buonarroti lots

in 1804 really came from Michelangelo’s family. This is

because the reference to the Buonarroti Collection in lot

268 , which contained ten drawings, may have applied not

to the entire contents of that lot but only to two draw-

ings – one described as “a monstrous animal, black chalk”

and probably identifiable with W 50 /Corpus 305 in the

British Museum (with a provenance from the Welles-

ley Collection) and the other with a sheet in the British

Library bearing a chalk sketch on one side and a poem

on the other, acquired at the sale of Samuel Rogers in

1856 (Corpus 217 ). The reason for doubting a Buonar-

roti provenance for the remaining eight drawings in lot

268 is because their description dovetails neatly with the

descriptions of four other lots, all of which are stated to

have come “from the Martelli collection, in Florence.” It

is uncertain therefore whether the Michelangelo draw-

ings with a Buonarroti provenance in this sale num-

bered twenty-five or seventeen. The lots originating with

Martelli would, correspondingly, have provided either

twenty-seven or – assuming that eight of the ten drawings

in lot 268 also came from the Martelli – thirty-six studies

of heads or body parts. The Martelli were a venerable

and famous Florentine family, with extensive holdings of

painting and sculpture of the highest quality, but noth-

ing seems to be known about their drawings.^91 However,

given that large numbers of their drawings were sold in

single lot “bundles,” individual sheets cannot have been

highly prized.

Two further lots, each comprising a single drawing,

werestated to have come “from Count Geloso’s cabi-

net” (lot 276 ) and “from the Spada collection at Rome”

(lot 278 ). Only one lot (lot 272 ), containing a single

drawing, had an English provenance, from Sir Peter Lely.

This re-appeared as lot15 8 8in the 1814 sale at which it

wasnodoubt acquired directly or indirectly by William

Esdaile: It can be identified with the autograph drawing

byMichelangelo now in Hamburg ( 21094 /Corpus 35 ).