Numbered "15".
Watermark: none.
The drawing is a study for a fresco over the altar of the oratory in the Villa Rosselli del Turco (now Franceschi) at Poggio alla Noce, dated 1545. It represents a fictive triptych: at center the Crucifixion with Saints Jerome and Francis, in the sidepanels Saints Michael and Tobias and the angel, with figures adoring the cross in a roundel in a cove, and roundels of the Angel of the Annunciation and the Virgin Annunciate above. Often confused with Pontormo, Foschi is from Florence. His drawings are rare (fewer than ten), and studies for known works even rarer. There are two drawings by him in Oxford, one at Christ Church and another in the Ashmolean Museum. Our new drawing makes an important addition to the Morgan collection, which has beautiful studies by Florentine artists but until now nothing by Foschi. Until 1957, when the artist's name was established as Foschi, he was misidentified as Toschi because of an incorrect of a document (see Donato Sanminiatelli, "Appunti: Foschi non Toschi," Paragone, no. 91, July 1957, pp. 55-57).
Scharf, Alfred, former owner.
Riley-Smith, Crispian, former owner.
Selected references: Pouncey 1957, 158-59; Forlani 1962, 243; Edinburgh 1969, 16-17, no. 36; Forlani Tempesti, in Florence, 1980, 117, no. 221; Petrioli Tofani 1992, 322, note 9.
M. Pouncey, "Five Drawings by Pierfrancesco di Jacopo di Domenico Toschi," The Burlington Magazine, XCVIX, 1957, p. 159, pl. 22.
A. Forlani, Disegni Italiani del cinquento, Florence, 1962, p. 243, pl. 94; Edinburgh, The Merchant's Hall, Italian 16th Century Drawings from British Private Collections, 1969, no. 36, pl. 56.
Florence, Palazzo Strozzi, Il primato del disegno, 1980, no. 221.