Laocoön and a son attacked by serpents within a cartouche

The Northern watermark and scrollwork seen in this drawing sufficiently prove that it is not Italian, as previously thought, but the work of a Northern artist. More specifically, the ornament, often called ‘Floris style’ after Cornelis Floris, points to a Netherlandish origin (see A. Huysmans et al., Cornelis Floris, 1514-1575. Beeldhouwer, architect, ontwerper, Brussels, 1996). The few known drawings by Cornelis Floris betray a less confident style then evident here, however, and the flowing penmanship of the figures at the centre of this composition, as well as the oval face, elongated, elastic limbs, and large feet, point to his brother, the famous painter Frans Floris. The same sketch-like style can be found in several of the most secure drawings by Floris, all datable in the years around 1550, such as Saint John the Evangelist in a cauldron of boiling oil at the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels (inv. 4060/3940; see J.O. Hand in The Age of Bruegel: Netherlandish Drawings in the Sixteenth Century, exhib. cat., Washington, National Gallery of Art, and New York, The Pierpont Morgan Library, 1986-1987, no. 47, ill.; and E. Wouk, Frans Floris (1519/20-1570): Imagining a Northern Renaissance, Leiden and Boston, 2018, pp. 197, 638-639, no. 47, fig. 5.21); The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist at the Kupferstich-Kabinett, Dresden (inv. C 842; see C. Dittrich, Van Eyck, Bruegel, Rembrandt. Niederländische Zeichnungen des 15. Bis 17. Jahrhunderts aus dem Kupferstich-Kabinett Dresden, exhib. cat., Dresden, Albertinum, Brühlsche Terrasse, and Vienna, Kunstforum, 1997-1998, no. 18, ill.; and Wouk, op. cit., pp. 197, 638-639, no. 48, fig. 5.22); and The Fall of Phaeton in the same collection (inv. C 587; see Wouk, op. cit., pp. 211, 640-641, no. 55, fig. 5.36).

The drawing is remarkable for its use of scrollwork which is not a common feature in Frans’s œuvre, although it is occasionally used, as for instance in the cartouches accompanying six scenes from the life of Jacob, probably designs for decorated metalware, engraved by Cornelis Cort (E.H. Wouk, Frans Floris, Ouderkerk aan den IJssel, 2011, I, nos. 19-21, ill.). Often inspired by antique models which he studied first-hand during a stay in Rome in the early 1540s, Floris would certainly have known and admired the famous marble group of Laocoön and his sons, which has been on view at the Vatican since its discovery in Rome in 1506. This drawing must have been a design for some sculpted or decorative work, and attests to Floris’s humanist culture. The printmaker Cornelis Bos, who also worked after Frans Floris, made a print (after Marco Dente) of the marble in 1548 (S. Schéle, Cornelis Bos. A Study of the Origins of the Netherlands Grotesque, Stockholm, 1965, no. 48, pl. 18), and the present drawing may be from around that date.