Guercino

Watermark: Fleur-de-lis in shield, surmounted by crown (Strasbourg lily).
This drawing represents an early idea for the Virgin of the Rosary with SS. Dominic and Catherine of Siena painted in 1637 for the Compagnia di Rosario and installed in the church of S. Domenico, Turin. The basic elements of the altarpiece are shown in the drawing, but the proportions of the figures relative to the picture field would be changed, with the angels in the sky, the architectural setting, and a crowd in the background all more prominent in the final painting. Moreover, while St. Catherine is shown kneeling in a pose akin to that in the final work, she is in the altarpiece handed a rosary not by the Virgin, but by the Christ Child, while St. Dominic would be moved to kneel opposite St. Catherine rather than standing beside her. As can be expected in a drawing from this late point in Guercino's career, the grandly rhetorical gesture given to St. Dominic in the drawing also would be tempered in the painting. Later stages in the evolution of the composition can be seen in two further studies: a lost drawing recorded in a copy by Bartolozzi now in the Albertina brings the poses of the saints close to those in the final painting, and a red chalk drawing in the British Museum reduces the relative size of the Virgin, Child, and saints closer to that in the final painting, allowing more space for the angels in the upper part of the canvas. Given Guercino's usual tendency to make compositional sketches in pen, ink, and wash like the Morgan drawing, the red chalk British Museum drawing could possibly be the modello that the artist was required to show his patrons for approval before he began painting. -- Catalog entry: Guercino : virtuoso draftsman, Morgan Library & Museum, 2019, p. 78.
While this drawing was in the collection of John Michael Rysbrack, it was engraved by William Wynne Wyland for Charles Rogers, A Collection of Prints in Imitation of Drawings, printed by J. Nichols and sold by J. Boydell, London, 1778, 108-II. The Morgan preserves an impression of Wyland's print (see IV, 167a).