Italian School, mid 16th Century

A male nude in a contorted pose

Details

Italian School, mid 16th Century
A male nude in a contorted pose
with inscription 'Il Ladron cativo/ di Michelagnolo Bonaroti in Mantua 1582'
black chalk, pen and brown ink, brown wash, the corners cut and the right edge cut around the inscription
10 7/8 x 8¼ in. (27.8 x 20.9 cm)

Provenance

John Bouverie, Delapré Abbey, near Northampton (1722/1723-1750) (L. 325).
John Watkins Brett, London (1805-1863); Christie's, 8 April 1864, lot 526, 'M.Angelo. A falling figure, in the Last Judgment - Indian ink' (illustrated in the catalogue, £1 to Bloxam).
M.H. Bloxam, by whom given to Rugby School Art Museum.

Literature

Anne Popham, typescript catalogue, no. 24, as after Michelangelo.

Sale room notice

We are grateful to Monroe Warshaw for pointing out a drawing showing the same model, from a different angle, and with the same inscription in the same hand at the Szépművészeti Múzeum, Budapest (inv. 2151; see K. Achilles-Syndram et al., Kunst Des Sammelns. Das Praunsche Kabinett. Meisterwerke von Dürer bis Carracci, exhib. cat., Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, 1994, no. 114, ill.). Furthermore, a drawing which bears an inscription in the same hand as that in the present drawing in the Teylers Museum, Haarlem (inv. I 8; see C. van Tuyll van Serooskerken, The Italian Drawings of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries in the Teyler Museum, Ghent and Doornspijk, 2000, no. 79, ill.). The figure shown in the Teylers sheet shows a Bad Thief from a bronze Crucifixion that was attributed to Michelangelo in the sixteenth century and is still associated with the artist, despite the lack of documentation.

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Phoebe Tronzo

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Lot Essay

Perhaps a copy after one of the thieves in an unidentified Cruxifixion scene, as the inscription suggests, the present drawing is characterised by a sculptural definition of the body, subtly modelled with passages of wash. The reference to a ‘bad thief’ by Michelangelo might refer to a bronze group […] based upon a drawing by Michelangelo in the Teylers Museum, alternatively attributed to Annibale Fontana or Guglielmo della Porta and based upon a drawing by Michelangelo.

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