Guercino

While the high level of finish might suggest that this drawing was a preparatory study for a painting, there is no corresponding work known nor mentioned in the "Libro dei Conti." Instead, the drawing was either an end in itself or, more likely, a preparatory study for a print: there exist both a counterproof at Windsor and a related print by Francesco Curti. The offset in the Royal Collection was pulled when the drawing was still merely a study of the Virgin and Child with a pot of flowers, with the background not yet complete. Given the existence of the engraving, as well as the fact that pulling a counterproof usually required the type of roller press used for printing, Guercino was likely in close collaboration with Curti even while drawing the present sheet. The counterproof, that is, would have been taken in medias res, perhaps to see how the composition would work in reverse; in the end, however, Curti's print is in the same direction as Guercino's drawing. Curti's print bears a dedication from Ercole Prini to Giovanni Battista Ferri, the patrons responsible, respectively, for The Martyrdom of St. James the Greater of 1627 and for the St. Joseph and the Christ Child of 1637-38, and it likely corresponds to the time when Guercino was working on those projects. The style of the drawing is that of the mid-1630s, so a date toward the end of that range seems most likely. It is perhaps not a coincidence that around the same time, in 1636, Guercino painted a Virgin and Child with a book for Cardinal Durazzo (now at the Phoenix Art Museum); although different in composition, it shares the central motif with the Morgan drawing. The counterproof now at Windsor would have been made by putting the drawing through the press together with a dampened sheet of paper. Perhaps inspired by the slight blurring of the chalk that would occur during that process, Guercino further exploited the possibilities of the medium by taking a wetted brush to parts of the original drawing, creating areas of pink tone that work in combination with the sharp lines of the chalk to create a beautifully pictorial effect. -- Catalog entry: Guercino : virtuoso draftsman, Morgan Library & Museum, 2019, pp. 75-76.