School of Benvenuto Cellini

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School of Benvenuto Cellini

1500-1571

Design for a Dish: Standing Male Nude Holding a Scallop Shell on His Shoulders, and Other Sketches. Verso: Acanthus Scrolls with Male Nude

Pen and brown ink over black chalk, with red chalk, on paper; traces of framing lines in brown ink; verso: pen and brown ink, over black chalk.

8 3/8 x 5 7/8 inches (212 x 149 mm)

Purchased by Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913) in 1909.

I, 34a (recto)

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Description:

As first noted by Philip Pouncey, the drawing is by the same hand as a double-sided study descended from the collections of August Grahl and Benno Geiger, now in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.¹ The London drawing, executed in pen and ink over black chalk, bears a design for a grotesque mask flanked by a pair of naked boys among acanthus scrolls and an alternative mask above. The verso contains a design for a sauce-boat or other dish as well as a faintly sketched medallion containing a bearded man’s head in profile.

The drawing was purchased by its former owner Charles Fairfax Murray as by Benvenuto Cellini and entered Morgan’s collection as school of Cellini. The author of the designs remains unknown, though he appears to have been left-handed.

Footnotes:

Victoria & Albert Museum, London, inv. E.4474-1920.

Notes:

Watermark: none.
Formerly attributed to Manno di Bastiano Sbarri.

Provenance:

Sir Thomas Lawrence (1769-1830), London (Lugt 2445); Samuel Woodburn (1786-1853), London (L. 2584); his sale, Christie's, London, 5 June 1860, lot 256; purchased by "Enson" (according to an annotation in the Woodburn catalog, Christie's archive); his sale, London, Sotheby's, Wilkinson & Hodge, 20 June 1891, no. 216 as Benvenuto Cellini, one of two drawings; to Murray £7.7.0; Charles Fairfax Murray (1849-1919), London and Florence; from whom purchased through Galerie Alexandre Imbert, Rome, in 1909 by Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), New York (no mark; see Lugt 1509); his son, J. P. Morgan, Jr. (1867-1943), New York.

Associated names:

Sbarri, Manno, di Sebastiano, approximately 1510-1576, Formerly attributed to.
Lawrence, Thomas, Sir, 1769-1830, former owner.
Woodburn, Samuel, 1785 or 1786-1853, former owner.
Murray, Charles Fairfax, 1849-1919, former owner.
Morgan, J. Pierpont (John Pierpont), 1837-1913, former owner.
Morgan, J. P. (John Pierpont), 1867-1943, former owner.

Bibliography:

Selected references: Planiczig and Voss 1920, 6, under no. 15, (as Cesare da Sesto); Ward-Jackson 1979, 1: 213, under no. 466 (as Lombard mid-16th century).

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