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Lot Essay
This is part of a group of single figure studies drawn by Cigoli on dark prepared paper powerfully heightened with white. Many of these chiaroscuro drawings are in the figure section at the Uffizi, Florence, with two further at Oxford and the Louvre. The drawings from the group are dated to the artist's late phase. Examples of such drawings at the Uffizi are reproduced in F. Faranda, Ludovico Cardi, detto il Cigoli, Rome, 1986, no. 5b (8995F), 16a (8965F), no. 37a (8980F), no. 60a (8970F), no. 78d (8966F), no. 79b (8996F). Also in the Uffizi are 9036F, 8920F and 8935F, M.L. Chappell, Disegni di Lodovico Cigoli, exhib. cat., Uffizi, Florence, 1992, nos. 3a, 6 and 115. Two further drawings of the same type are in the Louvre, from the Baldinucci Collection (F. Faranda, op. cit., no. 86a) and in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, K.T Parker, Catalogue of the Collection of Drawings in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 1956, no. 199, pl. XLVII.
Most of these drawings had a specific function in the preparation of paintings or frescoes. The present sheet was probably also a study for a larger composition, although it cannot be connected to a specific project. In the 1967 exhibition catalogue of the Meissner drawings, Mina Gregori suggested a date of around 1600, comparing it with a drawing in the Uffizi for the drapery of the boy on the left of Investiture of Cosimo I as the Grand Master of the Order of Saint Stephen in the Church of Santo Stefano in Pisa dated 1605, F. Faranda, op. cit., nos. 60 and 60a (8970F).
Cigoli was particularly concerned with the position of the right arm in the present drawing, as is shown by the black chalk pentimento showing the arm initially in a slightly more raised position. The figure may have been intended for a martyrdom, such as in the famous Martyrdom of Saint Stephen of 1597 in the Galleria Palatina, Florence. As preparatory drawings for this painting show, the artist initially planned stone throwers seen from behind, later omitted from the painting, M. Chappell, op. cit., nos. 39-40, illustrated.
Most of these drawings had a specific function in the preparation of paintings or frescoes. The present sheet was probably also a study for a larger composition, although it cannot be connected to a specific project. In the 1967 exhibition catalogue of the Meissner drawings, Mina Gregori suggested a date of around 1600, comparing it with a drawing in the Uffizi for the drapery of the boy on the left of Investiture of Cosimo I as the Grand Master of the Order of Saint Stephen in the Church of Santo Stefano in Pisa dated 1605, F. Faranda, op. cit., nos. 60 and 60a (8970F).
Cigoli was particularly concerned with the position of the right arm in the present drawing, as is shown by the black chalk pentimento showing the arm initially in a slightly more raised position. The figure may have been intended for a martyrdom, such as in the famous Martyrdom of Saint Stephen of 1597 in the Galleria Palatina, Florence. As preparatory drawings for this painting show, the artist initially planned stone throwers seen from behind, later omitted from the painting, M. Chappell, op. cit., nos. 39-40, illustrated.