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Lot Essay
As with the previous drawing, the attribution to Perino del Vaga was confirmed by Linda Wolk-Simon (op. cit.), who dated this sheet to around 1525-1527 – just before the artist’s departure from Rome for Genoa, at the invitation of Andrea Doria. By 1525 Perino had benefitted from the departure of Giulio Romano for Mantua, and from his own marriage to Luca Penni’s sister, Caterina, thereby inheriting Raphael’s legacy in the Papal city, in particular for fresco decoration.
The recto of the present sheet shows a group of energetically postured figures, gathered around a fragmentary column – mostly nude and seemingly unrelated, characteristic of Perino’s drawings. Stylistically the drawing can be compared to a study sheet in the Uffizi (inv. 16 E; see B. Davidson, Mostra dei disegni di Perino del Vaga e la sua cerchia, Florence, 1968, no. 11, ill.) for the Creation of Adam (1525-1527) in the vault of the Cappella del Crocifisso in San Marcello al Corso, Rome. The Uffizi drawing, accordingly, belongs to this moment in Perino’s activity between 1525 and 1527, and its close stylistic affinities with the recto of the present sheet suggest that the latter too should be dated to the mid-1520s. However, the purpose of these ink studies remains unknown.
The source for the diagram of the winds, or rosa dei venti, on the verso, has been identified by Frank Dabell (see the 2003 catalogue of Katrin Bellinger Kunsthandel, p. 106) as the 1521 edition of Vitruvius’s Ten Books of Architecture by Cesare Cesariano which discusses ‘the direction of the streets, with remarks on the winds’ (book 1, chapter 6). During the first half of the 16th Century Vitruvius’ text was disseminated primarily through Cesariano’s illustrated edition, which includes a diagram entitled, like Perino’s drawing, Ventorum regiones horarumque indicatio (indication of the regions of the winds and hours). Cesariano’s diagram illustrates the twenty-four winds named in Perino’s drawing, and similarly displays the south wind (meridies) at the top of the sheet. Perino traced the diagram with the aid of a compass – the hole is visible at the center of the sheet. The artist’s purpose in copying the diagram may have been purely scientific or alternatively, as Wolk-Simon suggested, Perino might have intended to use the design for the ceiling or small cupola of the Torre Borgia in the Vatican Palace, a decoration that either remained unexecuted or has not survived. Perino had already demonstrated his familiarity with Vitruvius’ text in the ceiling decorations of the Sala dei Pontefici (1520-1521).
The recto of the present sheet shows a group of energetically postured figures, gathered around a fragmentary column – mostly nude and seemingly unrelated, characteristic of Perino’s drawings. Stylistically the drawing can be compared to a study sheet in the Uffizi (inv. 16 E; see B. Davidson, Mostra dei disegni di Perino del Vaga e la sua cerchia, Florence, 1968, no. 11, ill.) for the Creation of Adam (1525-1527) in the vault of the Cappella del Crocifisso in San Marcello al Corso, Rome. The Uffizi drawing, accordingly, belongs to this moment in Perino’s activity between 1525 and 1527, and its close stylistic affinities with the recto of the present sheet suggest that the latter too should be dated to the mid-1520s. However, the purpose of these ink studies remains unknown.
The source for the diagram of the winds, or rosa dei venti, on the verso, has been identified by Frank Dabell (see the 2003 catalogue of Katrin Bellinger Kunsthandel, p. 106) as the 1521 edition of Vitruvius’s Ten Books of Architecture by Cesare Cesariano which discusses ‘the direction of the streets, with remarks on the winds’ (book 1, chapter 6). During the first half of the 16th Century Vitruvius’ text was disseminated primarily through Cesariano’s illustrated edition, which includes a diagram entitled, like Perino’s drawing, Ventorum regiones horarumque indicatio (indication of the regions of the winds and hours). Cesariano’s diagram illustrates the twenty-four winds named in Perino’s drawing, and similarly displays the south wind (meridies) at the top of the sheet. Perino traced the diagram with the aid of a compass – the hole is visible at the center of the sheet. The artist’s purpose in copying the diagram may have been purely scientific or alternatively, as Wolk-Simon suggested, Perino might have intended to use the design for the ceiling or small cupola of the Torre Borgia in the Vatican Palace, a decoration that either remained unexecuted or has not survived. Perino had already demonstrated his familiarity with Vitruvius’ text in the ceiling decorations of the Sala dei Pontefici (1520-1521).