Lot Essay
Giulio's seemingly limitless powers of invention were exploited to the full in the enormous project to decorate the Palazzo del Te, Mantua. Trained in the highly organized studio of Raphael, Giulio established a similar one in Mantua: his frescoes painted largely by assistants following designs such as the present one. Although the present drawing cannot be directly related to any specific frieze in the palace, there are a number which contain similar elements; such as that in the Sala dei Cavalli which has acanthus scrolls with putti, A. Belluzzi and K.W. Forster, in Giulio Romano, exhib. cat., Mantua, Palazzo del Te, 1989, p. 232, illustrated. In the same room the ceiling is decorated with figures intertwined with acanthus scrolls, ibid, p. 244, illustrated. Fermo da Caravaggio painted in 1533 a, now lost, frieze of foliage and animals in the attic of the courtyard, and Verheyen suggests that this drawing may be a study for this project.
The now detached and lost mount of this drawing had an inscription by Richardson junior: 'is a Bas-relief (almost flat) is not mostly the same with this Dr: tis without any considerable difference. R. Jun'. Richardson presumably knew of an Antique frieze which resembled this study, although it is clearly a working drawing and not simply a ricordo. The line at the extreme left drawn down the centre of the bust of Diana of Ephesus and the lion's mask below, suggest that it was intended to be at the end of the frieze; a similar arrangement appears in the Sala dei Cavalli where goats' heads just below the frieze are divided into two at each corner of the room. The assistants, for whom this drawing was intended, would have readily understood such shorthand, and would have completed the figures. A comparable study for a frieze, which Richardson senior compared to an Antique relief he had seen in Rome, is in the British Museum, P. Pouncey and J.A. Gere, Raphael and his Circle, London, 1962, I, no. 90, II, pl. 83.
The Fifth Exhibition of drawings from the collection of Sir Thomas Lawrence included twenty-five drawings by Giulio, all of which were bought by Lord Francis Egerton, later 1st Earl of Ellesmere. He bought more drawings by the artist from the Sixth Exhibition
The now detached and lost mount of this drawing had an inscription by Richardson junior: 'is a Bas-relief (almost flat) is not mostly the same with this Dr: tis without any considerable difference. R. Jun'. Richardson presumably knew of an Antique frieze which resembled this study, although it is clearly a working drawing and not simply a ricordo. The line at the extreme left drawn down the centre of the bust of Diana of Ephesus and the lion's mask below, suggest that it was intended to be at the end of the frieze; a similar arrangement appears in the Sala dei Cavalli where goats' heads just below the frieze are divided into two at each corner of the room. The assistants, for whom this drawing was intended, would have readily understood such shorthand, and would have completed the figures. A comparable study for a frieze, which Richardson senior compared to an Antique relief he had seen in Rome, is in the British Museum, P. Pouncey and J.A. Gere, Raphael and his Circle, London, 1962, I, no. 90, II, pl. 83.
The Fifth Exhibition of drawings from the collection of Sir Thomas Lawrence included twenty-five drawings by Giulio, all of which were bought by Lord Francis Egerton, later 1st Earl of Ellesmere. He bought more drawings by the artist from the Sixth Exhibition