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Lot Essay
Before being adopted by the first academies in Italy, life drawing classes were common practice in artist's studios and in informal groups. From the late sixteenth century onwards, however, it became part of the curriculum at the academies in Florence and Rome. Life drawing was considered an important part of the artistic training, and the foundation of Guercino's Accademia del Nudo in the Casa Fabri in Bologna is testimony to this, as are the countless male nude drawings from this period that are known today.
Pietro da Cortona seems not to have been an exception among his contemporaries when it came to life drawing; a fair number of red chalk male academy nudes by his hand are known. They were first studied as a whole by Jörg Martin Merz in his 2005 article on the subject ('Life Drawings by Pietro da Cortona', Master Drawings, XLIII, no. 4, 2005, pp. 457-487). On the basis of two securely attributed drawings (both related to prints), Merz identified 24 nude studies which can be given to Cortona. These drawings, all in red chalk, display clearly defined contours, sometimes re-drawn several times, and smoothly rendered skin and muscles. They are often placed in a setting with a background that consist of subtle parallel hatching. As the drawings are stylistically so close, Merz has suggested that they were probably made around the same time, in the early 1630s (ibid., p. 468).
Cautiously attributed to Guido Reni by Anne Popham (op. cit.), the present drawing was recently connected to this group by Nicholas Turner, to whom we are very grateful, on the basis of its stylistic and technical similarities. Like the drawings published by Merz, this red chalk nude is carefully defined with clear outlines and the muscles are modelled with soft chalk in Cortona's characteristic style. This sheet is particularly close to a drawing showing Pan in a private collection and a nude study in the Albertina, Vienna (Merz, op. cit., no. A17, fig. 9 and no. A22, fig. 7). It is furthermore of similar size to most of Cortona's nude studies, which usually measure around 40 x 26 cm.
We are grateful to Jörg Merz for endorsing the attribution on the basis of a digital photograph.
Pietro da Cortona seems not to have been an exception among his contemporaries when it came to life drawing; a fair number of red chalk male academy nudes by his hand are known. They were first studied as a whole by Jörg Martin Merz in his 2005 article on the subject ('Life Drawings by Pietro da Cortona', Master Drawings, XLIII, no. 4, 2005, pp. 457-487). On the basis of two securely attributed drawings (both related to prints), Merz identified 24 nude studies which can be given to Cortona. These drawings, all in red chalk, display clearly defined contours, sometimes re-drawn several times, and smoothly rendered skin and muscles. They are often placed in a setting with a background that consist of subtle parallel hatching. As the drawings are stylistically so close, Merz has suggested that they were probably made around the same time, in the early 1630s (ibid., p. 468).
Cautiously attributed to Guido Reni by Anne Popham (op. cit.), the present drawing was recently connected to this group by Nicholas Turner, to whom we are very grateful, on the basis of its stylistic and technical similarities. Like the drawings published by Merz, this red chalk nude is carefully defined with clear outlines and the muscles are modelled with soft chalk in Cortona's characteristic style. This sheet is particularly close to a drawing showing Pan in a private collection and a nude study in the Albertina, Vienna (Merz, op. cit., no. A17, fig. 9 and no. A22, fig. 7). It is furthermore of similar size to most of Cortona's nude studies, which usually measure around 40 x 26 cm.
We are grateful to Jörg Merz for endorsing the attribution on the basis of a digital photograph.