The three Fates

Baldi learned his pictorial drawing technique and figural language from Pietro da Cortona, to whom this drawing was initially attributed. Cortona painted the three fates on the ceiling of Palazzo Barberini, which Baldi certainly knew and emulated in this highly finished work, likely made to be engraved possibly for a thesis. We are grateful to Simonetta Prosperi Valenti Rodino' and Ursula Fischer Pace for confirming the attribution based on a digital photograph.