Lot Essay
Chris Fischer thinks that this drawing might be a primo pensiero for the figure of Christ in the painting of Salvator Mundi, in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence, datable to 1516, C. Fischer, Fra Bartolommeo, Master Draughtsman of the High Renaissance, A selection from the Rotterdam Albums and Landscape Drawings from various Collections, exhib. cat., Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam, 1990, fig. 207. The present drawing is a free copy in reverse after Michelangelo's David of 1501-4, with the addition of a drape over the shoulders of the model. The picture was commissioned, along with two panels of the prophets Isaiah and Job, by Salvatore da Bartolomeo di Antonio Billi for his newly created chapel in the church of Santissima Annunziata, in Florence. The altarpiece was subsequently acquired for the collection of Cardinal Carlo de'Medici, brought to Paris in 1798 and returned to Florence after the Empire.
The present drawing reveals the intricate nature of a commission in which Michelangelo had apparently been greatly involved. The chapel is shaped like an antique triumphal arch and the pictures were placed over the altar in the deep barrel-vaulted niche in the centre, C. Fischer, op. cit., figs. 208-9. Chris Fischer had pointed out that the architecture of the altar was probably designed by Michelangelo and executed by Piero Rosselli (1474?-1531), C. Fischer, op. cit, pp. 320-23. The marble used in the architecture came from the same quarry in Carrara as that imported by Michelangelo for the planned façade of San Lorenzo. With Michelangelo as the architect of the chapel it seems natural that Fra Bartolommeo would seek inspiration in Michelangelo's work for the pose of his main figure. Fra Bartolommeo and Michelangelo had shared the same political views, had worked on the same project of the Council Chamber at the Palazzo Signoria and were friends as testified by the drawn portrait of the sculptor, C. Fischer, op. cit, cat. no. 78 illustrated. The present drawing testifies to this interchange of ideas between the two artists. The floating drapery, lightly sketched, may easily be confused with the representation of a sling.
The development of the figure of Christ was therefore elaborated through a slow transformation of Michelangelo's David to the one of Christ in the final composition. It can be followed through a series of drawings among them a sheet in the British Museum that shows the figure in the same pose as in the final composition, Fischer, op. cit., fig. 258. The right arm has been raised and the right foot placed on a plinth. The drawing is not only related to Michelangelo's David, but also to Sansovino's Bacchus, now in the Bargello, Florence. Such reference to the world of sculpture is not unusual for the artist: a drawing of a Crucifixion is derived from a sculpture attributed to Benedetto da Maiano, and another composition from Donatello's Saint George, C. Fischer, op. cit, fig. 38 and 100.
Finally three studies in the Museum Boymans-van Beuningen studied the same pose as the one of the drawing in the British Museum, but this time draped (C. Fischer, op. cit., cat. no. 93, fig. 227 and 216) exactly as the final composition.
In a letter dated 11 May 1996, Chris Fisher relates the present drawing to a double sided drawing in the British Museum (inv. 1895-15-9-526) representing alternative studies for David of which one side is a copy after Donatello's bronze figure, now in the Bargello. The later sheet was sold as lot 163 in the Woodburn sale at Christie's in 1860, as was the present drawing.
Chris Fischer pointed out that both the present drawing and the British Museum sheet of Christ in the nude are stylistically close to drawings attributed to Sansovino, B. Boucher, The Sculpture of Jacopo Sansovino, New Haven and London, 1991, nos. 129-131, illustrated.
We are grateful to Chris Fisher for suggesting the attribution and for his assistance in cataloguing this drawing.
The present drawing reveals the intricate nature of a commission in which Michelangelo had apparently been greatly involved. The chapel is shaped like an antique triumphal arch and the pictures were placed over the altar in the deep barrel-vaulted niche in the centre, C. Fischer, op. cit., figs. 208-9. Chris Fischer had pointed out that the architecture of the altar was probably designed by Michelangelo and executed by Piero Rosselli (1474?-1531), C. Fischer, op. cit, pp. 320-23. The marble used in the architecture came from the same quarry in Carrara as that imported by Michelangelo for the planned façade of San Lorenzo. With Michelangelo as the architect of the chapel it seems natural that Fra Bartolommeo would seek inspiration in Michelangelo's work for the pose of his main figure. Fra Bartolommeo and Michelangelo had shared the same political views, had worked on the same project of the Council Chamber at the Palazzo Signoria and were friends as testified by the drawn portrait of the sculptor, C. Fischer, op. cit, cat. no. 78 illustrated. The present drawing testifies to this interchange of ideas between the two artists. The floating drapery, lightly sketched, may easily be confused with the representation of a sling.
The development of the figure of Christ was therefore elaborated through a slow transformation of Michelangelo's David to the one of Christ in the final composition. It can be followed through a series of drawings among them a sheet in the British Museum that shows the figure in the same pose as in the final composition, Fischer, op. cit., fig. 258. The right arm has been raised and the right foot placed on a plinth. The drawing is not only related to Michelangelo's David, but also to Sansovino's Bacchus, now in the Bargello, Florence. Such reference to the world of sculpture is not unusual for the artist: a drawing of a Crucifixion is derived from a sculpture attributed to Benedetto da Maiano, and another composition from Donatello's Saint George, C. Fischer, op. cit, fig. 38 and 100.
Finally three studies in the Museum Boymans-van Beuningen studied the same pose as the one of the drawing in the British Museum, but this time draped (C. Fischer, op. cit., cat. no. 93, fig. 227 and 216) exactly as the final composition.
In a letter dated 11 May 1996, Chris Fisher relates the present drawing to a double sided drawing in the British Museum (inv. 1895-15-9-526) representing alternative studies for David of which one side is a copy after Donatello's bronze figure, now in the Bargello. The later sheet was sold as lot 163 in the Woodburn sale at Christie's in 1860, as was the present drawing.
Chris Fischer pointed out that both the present drawing and the British Museum sheet of Christ in the nude are stylistically close to drawings attributed to Sansovino, B. Boucher, The Sculpture of Jacopo Sansovino, New Haven and London, 1991, nos. 129-131, illustrated.
We are grateful to Chris Fisher for suggesting the attribution and for his assistance in cataloguing this drawing.