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| Giulio Benso Abduction of the Sabine women before 1665 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Giulio Benso Adoration of the Shepherds before 1665 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Andrea Pozzo Religion assisted by Virtues, pointing to the portrait of Vittorio Amedeo II, Duke of Savoy 1680s drawing for engraving British Museum |
"According to the writer of the inscription, whose identity remains unknown, the drawing was sent from Rome by Francesco Maria Guelfi (1659-1744), a member of the novitiate of S. Andrea al Quirinale, who, like Andrea Pozzo himself, was a Jesuit. It is an early preparatory study, in reverse and with minor differences, for the print engraved to a larger scale by Georges Tasnière (d. 1704), a French engraver who worked extensively for the House of Savoy. . . . The finished composition shows Painting, accompanied by a putto or genius, at work on a portrait of the young Duke Vittorio Amedeo II (1666-1732), whose likeness she takes from that of his ancestor, the Blessed Amedeo IX, Duke of Savoy, who died in 1472. Watching Painting from nearby are Faith, Hope and Charity, with Justice, Fortitude and Prudence a little in the distance. Among the principal differences between drawing and print are the appearance in the latter of two putti in the lower left (corresponding in position to the empty space in the lower right of the drawing) holding a tablet containing the coat of arms of Francesco Gonteri, who had commissioned the print; and of a further female allegory, lower right."
"As Giuseppe Dardanello has observed, the print is a thinly veiled piece of flattery of the then regent Maria Giovanna Battista of Savoy, the young Duke's mother, who features as Religion in the composition. Indeed, the 'Allegory' alludes to her government's cultivation of the arts and literature as well as her promotion of her family's interests. Vittorio Amedeo II was only nine years old when, on 12 June 1675, he succeeded to the duchy at the death of his father, Carlo Emmanuele II. Maria Giovanna Battista's regency was characterised by her detestation of France and a desire to encourage in her son the pursuit of pleasure so that she might extend her own power at his expense. He eventually resisted this strategy and in due course took on the government of his own lands himself, becoming King of Sicily and Sardinia in 1713 and 1720, respectively. The date "1688" on the inscription may not necessarily indicate the date of the drawing itself."
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| Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione St Jerome writing in the wilderness before 1670 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Carlo Maratti Death of St Francis Xavier ca. 1675 drawing for Gesù altarpiece British Museum |
"This is an early compositional study for Maratti's altarpiece in the Gesù, Rome (chapel in the right transept) commissioned by Padre (later Cardinal) Giovanni Francesco Negroni in 1674, but completed only in 1679. The drawing and the painted altarpiece have few characteristics in common beyond their tall, somewhat narrow format, which would have been dictated from the start by Pietro da Cortona's altar design, conceived in the last year of his life. Yet despite such significant discrepancies, Schaar argued persuasively for a firm connection between the painting and the drawing, in accordance with the early inscription at the bottom of the sheet. It is likely, as Schaar pointed out, that the drawing was executed at a very early stage in the design process, prior to Andrea Carlone's involvement in the chapel decoration from July 1674, taking responsibility for the vault that was to have been assigned to Gaulli. This can be deduced from the appearance of Christ in the sky, whose figure, subsequently incorporated in the programme of Carlone's frescoed vault showing the coronation of the saint by the Trinity, is not present in later compositional sketches or in the altarpiece itself. In two intermediate compositional sketches, in the Accademia de San Fernando, Madrid and in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan, the figure of Christ has been substituted by an image of the saint himself, being carried heavenward by angels. In two further drawings, again in the Accademia de San Fernando, Madrid and in the Kunstmuseum, Düsseldorf this motif has, in its turn, been replaced by putti and angels scattering flowers, as in the finished painting. Presumably this change was effected after it was decided to sculpt, in stucco relief sited between the broken pediments of the elaborate frame, an effigy of the saint in glory in the process of making his way heavenward, thereby avoiding the need to duplicate this motif in the altarpiece itself. Another compositional study exists in the Biblioteca National, Madrid, apparently showing the saint lying on the right, as in the British Museum drawing."
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| Francesco Cozza Triumph of the Blessed Juan de Sahagún before 1682 drawing British Museum |
"The attribution to Cozza was first proposed by Dr. Erich Schleier, and is supported by the drawing's resemblance in style to the few surviving studies certainly by the artist and by the similarity of the group of the Trinity to that in Cozza's painting of the 'Holy Woman Martyrs' in the Berlin Gallery. The identification of the subject as the fifteenth-century Spanish Benedictine saint Juan de Sahagún is due to Dr. Jennifer Montagu. Juan de Sahagún, or Giovanni di S. Facondon was born in Sahagún (León, Spain) before 1430, transferring to Salamanca in the 1450s, where he died in 1479; he was beatified in 1601 and canonised in 1691. The Blessed Juan de Sahagún is represented in the drawing with his many attributes: the chalice and host symbolise his extraordinary devotion to the Eucharist; the Demon of Discord at his feet, accompanied by the discarded arms lying on the ground, allude to the civil disturbances in Salamanca which he helped to quell; the belt he is undoing from his waist is an allusion to his rescuing a boy from a well by hoisting him up with his belt; and the woman running in the background, holding a cup with a serpent inside it and putting a finger to her lips, is the woman of loose morals from whom he was able to detach a nobleman and who, in revenge, gave him a slow poison, from which he died. This violent death seems to justify the martyr's palm held by one of the angels at upper right; the other holds a lily, presumably referring to his chastity. From the drawing's painstaking finish, and from the blank space beneath it, which was probably intended to carry an inscription, it seems likely that the drawing was made for a print, though no such print has yet been identified.
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| Claude Lorrain Forge of Vulcan with three cyclops-workers and Vulcan on a throne - scene from the Aeneid before 1682 drawing British Museum |
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| Paolo Gerolamo Piola Rest on the Flight into Egypt ca. 1690-94 wash drawing Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas |
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| Pietro Lucatelli St Alexander of Bergamo and St Bartholomew ca. 1690-97 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Filippo Lauri Monk ordering destruction of pagan statues before 1690 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Giuseppe Passeri David and Abigail ca. 1670-1700 drawing Teylers Museum, Haarlem |
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| Giuseppe Passeri Assumption of the Virgin ca. 1686 drawing British Museum |
"This is a preparatory study for a print, in the same direction, by Arnold van Westerhout (1651-1725). The composition of the present drawing is based on two earlier painted versions of the subject by Passeri. One, datable 1686, is a fresco, in square format, in S. Maria in Aracoeli, Rome, and shows the Virgin almost full face, with two angels to the left particularly similar in pose to their counterparts in the later, engraved version. The second is an upright rectangular canvas of approximately the same date as the fresco, in the Pinacoteca Comunale, Rimini, in which the Virgin turns to the right, as in the engraving. In each step, from fresco to painting to engraving, the composition was simplified and the number of putti and angels reduced."
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| Giuseppe Passeri Christ driving money-changers from the temple ca. 1710 drawing Royal Collection, Windsor |
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| Giuseppe Passeri Angel appearing to Hagar and Ishmael before 1714 drawing British Museum |
– notes on the drawings are by Nicholas Turner, from Italian Drawings in the British Museum: Roman Baroque Drawings, ca. 1620-ca. 1700 (British Museum Press, 1999)