Giuseppe Cesari, Il Cavaliere d'Arpino (Arpino 1568-1640 Rome)
Giuseppe Cesari, Il Cavaliere d'Arpino (Arpino 1568-1640 Rome)

A study of a nude man, running towards the left

Details
Giuseppe Cesari, Il Cavaliere d'Arpino (Arpino 1568-1640 Rome)
A study of a nude man, running towards the left
with illegible, crossed out inscriptions (verso) and attribution 'Cav. Giuseppe d'Arpino.' (on the old mount)
red and black chalk, the corners cut and made up
10¼ x 8 in. (26 x 20.3 cm)
Provenance
William Gibson, London (1644-1703) (L. 5216, [illegible attribution] and his price code '1.3/ 3.2').
Sir Thomas Lawrence, London (1769-1830) (L. 2445).
Samuel Woodburn, London (1786-1853), from the Collection of Sir Thomas Lawrence; Christie's, 4 June 1860, part of lot 22 'the fall of Phaeton, D'ARPINO' (15s. to Bloxam).
M.H. Bloxam, by whom given to Rugby School Art Museum; with his initials 'M:H:B', inscription and attribution 'Rugby School Art Museum - e dono Matt: H: Bloxam 1880/ Cesari, Cavaliere Guiseppe, called D'Arpino. ad 1560[later changed to '8']-1640/ Fall of Phaeton/ Lawrence Collection' (on the mount).
Literature
Anne Popham, typescript catalogue, no. 8.

S. Prosperi Valenti Rodinò, Gallerie dell’Accademia di Venezia. Disegni romani, Milan, 1989, p. 79, under no. 54.
G. Nepi Scirè, Old Master Drawings from the Gallerie dell’Accademia Venice, Milan, 1990, p. 48, under no. 13.
L. Wolk-Simon, Italian Old Master Drawings from the Collection of Jeffrey E. Horvitz, exhib. cat., Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art, University of Florida, 1991, p. 68 under no. 17.
H. Röttgen, Il cavalier. Giuseppe Cesare D'Arpino. Un grande pittore nello splendore della fama e nell'incostanza della fortuna, Rome, 2002, pp. 308-309, fig. 68a.
H. Röttgen, Cavalier Giuseppe Cesare d'Arpino, Die Zeichnungen. I disegni, 1587/93-1605, Stuttgart, 2013,
no. 347, ill.
M.S. Bolzoni, Il Cavaliere Giuseppe Cesari d'Arpino. Maestro del disegno. Catalogo ragionato dell'opera grafica, Rome, 2013, no. D9 (as doubtful).
Exhibited
Rome, Palazzo Venezia, Il Cavaliere D'Arpino, 1973, no. 122, ill., p. 92.

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Phoebe Tronzo
Phoebe Tronzo

Lot Essay

Executed in black and red chalk, this dramatic life study was made for the fleeing apostle at left in The Betrayal of Christ in the Galleria Borghese (Fig. 1), painted by Arpino circa 1596/97 and praised by Giovanni Pietro Bellori as his best painting ('la più bella opera che facesse il Cavaliere è la Presa di Christo nell’horto in casa Borghese', Röttgen, op. cit., 2013, no. 347, ill.).

Arpino defined both the sinuous outlines of the man’s body and its sculptural volumes with confidence and particular attention to light and shadow, like that cast on the figure’s chest by his raised arm. Consistent with the artist’s method, while drawing inspiration from the great draughtsman of the Renaissance, Raphael and Michelangelo, Arpino verified the anatomical accuracy of this figure by using a live model, who posed by resting his left leg on a support. The studio prop is also observed in a closely comparable red chalk drawing in the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (M.S. Bolzoni, ‘Cavaliere d’Arpino: omaggio a Michelangelo’, in After 1564. Michelangelos Legacy in Late Cinquecento Rome, 2016, p. 131, fig. 13).

Within the design process of The Betrayal, the present sheet follows the rapid compositional sketch in the Kunsthaus Zurich (inv. A.B. 954). A companion is found in a nude study at Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice (inv. 1142; Prosperi Valenti Rodinò, op. cit., no. 54), for a figure ultimately not included in the painting.

Fig. 1. Giuseppe Cesari, Cavaliere d’Arpino, The Betrayal of Christ, c. 1596/97, oil on copper, 79 x 58 cm., Galleria Borghese, Rome (inv. 596)

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