Saint Peter

Only very few drawings are accepted by scholars as works by Hugo van der Goes. However, there are a number of Netherlandish drawings, made in pen and ink, that replicate van der Goes’ graphic vocabulary made of closely packed hatching and cross-hatching (see S. Buck, ‘Hugo van der Goes as a Draftsman’, in Hugo van der Goes between Pain and Bliss, exhib. cat., Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, 2022, pp. 63-69). The figures on those sheets, as that in the present drawing, are finely delineated with pen and ink and then carefully shaded with dense hatching and stippling. It was through engravings that the master’s style was transmitted and made accessible to other artists.

According to older descriptions of the drawing, there was an inscription, ‘Aldgrever’, by the lower right corner of this sheet.