Italian School

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Italian School

16th century

Design for a "Spandrel" with Grotesques; Alternate Study for Lunette-Shaped Central Section. Verso: Sheet of Studies: TThree Figures Before a Niche Containing a Statue of Fame, Flanked by Hercules and Another Male Heroic Nude; Man Peering Through a Hole and Colonnade with Statue

ca. 1538-1547

Pen and dark brown ink, over red chalk, on paper. Verso: pen and dark brown ink, brown wash, over red chalk.

4 1/8 x 5 15/16 inches (105 x 150 mm)

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

II, 28a

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Description:

One of a group of drawings by the same hand, once part of the Casare da Sesto album, but not by him.¹ The sheets contain several studies for wall and ceiling decorations, particularly grotesques. The sketches appear to be aide-mémoires, which are labeled with their city of origin (Florence, Rome, Genoa, Cremona, and Trent). The three-quarter length man leaning from an oculus seems to derive from a drawing by Girolamo Romanino, which is also in the Morgan’s collection.²

Footnotes:

Morgan Library & Museum, New York, inv. II 26a, 27a, 29a.
Morgan Library & Museum, New York, inv.1985.94.

Notes:

Watermark: none.
One of thirty four sixteenth-century Italian drawings formerly mounted in a nineteenth-century album, the Cesare da Sesto Album.
The Morgan Library owns a drawing by Girolamo Romanino depicting a series of studies of a figure within an oculus, similar to the figure at upper right on the verso of this sheet (1985.94).

Inscription:

Inscribed at upper right, in pen and brown ink: "Roma"; at lower right, in pen and brown ink: "Genua / genua (?)"; on verso, at lower right, in pen and brown ink: "Cremona in foro".

Provenance:

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:

Romanino, Girolamo, approximately 1485-approximately 1566, Formerly attributed to.
Murray, Charles Fairfax, 1849-1919, former owner.
Morgan, J. Pierpont (John Pierpont), 1837-1913, former owner.

Bibliography:

Selected references: Fairfax Murray 1905-12, 2: no. tk, (as Cesare da Sesto).

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