Ferdinando Galli Bibiena

This remarkable working drawing illustrates various stages of the creative process. A graphite underdrawing provided the precise perspective before the artist fluidly rendered the architectural surface ornament of festoons and scrolls in pen and ink. The design also includes notations that suggest how it would be realized in the three-dimensional space of the theater: letters corresponding to different scenery flats that would have come together to create the appearance of a unified stage set. The flats labeled “G” and “H” were probably lowered from the rafters, whereas “B” and “F” would have been wheeled in from the wings of the stage.