Study of a Male Nude for a Pietà

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Specifications

Title	Study of a Male Nude for a Pietà
Material and technique	Black chalk, heightened with white, squared for transfer
Object type	Drawing > Two-dimensional object > Art object
Location	This object is in storage

Dimensions	Width 225 mm Height 279 mm
Artists	Draughtsman: Andrea Lilio Previously attributed: Angelo Bronzino
Accession number	I 188 recto (PK)
Credits	Loan Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (former Koenigs collection), 1940
Department	Drawings & Prints
Acquisition date	1940
Creation date	in circa 1596
Watermark	kneeling saint holding a cross, in a shield (large fragment, upper part, 46 x 38 mm, on P5 of 8P, centre of left margin, vV, half folio sheet), similar to Briquet 7628-7629 (resp. Fabriano 1602, Rome 1566), esp. the latter (shield top), none in Piccard Online, similar ones in drawings by Francesco Curradi and Ercole Bazzicaluva in the Fondation Custodia (Byam Shaw 1983, nos. 56 and 66 resp., both 17th-c., WM repr. vol. 2, p. 123) and one by Pierre Monnier, dated 1665-66 in the Yale University Art Galleries (Boorsch/Marciari 2006, no. 54, WM repr. p. 251) [see image]
Inscriptions	‘Allori [possibly ‘Luini’]’ (below centre, pen and brown ink), ‘4x’ (verso, lower left., red chalk), ‘5’ (verso, lower right, pen and brown ink)
Collector	Collector / Franz Koenigs
Mark	J. Reynolds (L.2364), E. Wauters (L.911), F.W. Koenigs (L.1023a)
Provenance	Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792, L.2364)*, London; - ; Emile Wauters (1846-1933, L.911), Paris; his sale, Amsterdam (Muller) 15-16.06.1926, lot 9 (Bronzino, Fl 490 to R.W.P. de Vries); Franz W. Koenigs (1881-1941, L.1023a), Haarlem, acquired in 1926 (Angelo Bronzino); D.G. van Beuningen (1877-1955), Rotterdam, acquired with the Koenigs Collection in 1940 and donated to Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen
Exhibitions	Amsterdam 1934, no. 504 (Bronzino); Paris 1935, no. 528; Rotterdam/New York 1990, no. 70; Rotterdam 2009 (coll 2 kw 2)
Internal exhibitions	Van Pisanello tot Cézanne (1992) De Collectie Twee - wissel II, Prenten & Tekeningen (2009)
Research	Show research Italian Drawings 1400-1600
Literature	Lees 1913, p. 87, fig. 99 (Bronzino); Vasari Society 1920-35, vol. 11 (1930), pp. 124-25, pl. 2-D (Bronzino); Paris 1935, no. 528, pl. 34; Berenson 1938, no. 604 B, fig. 1002 (Bronzino); Berenson 1961, p. 117, no. 605 D-1 (Bronzino); Luijten/Meij 1990, no. 70, ill., fig. 1 (verso); Ward Nelson 1991, p. 187, pl. 3-4; Cellini 1992, p. 99; Di Giampaolo 1995, pp. 77-79; Pulini 2001, pp. 51, 57, 63, fig. 6; Pulini 2003, no. 7, pp. 197-199, ill.; Agenda 2013, no. 7, ill.
Material	Black chalk > Chalk > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique
Object	Drawing > Two-dimensional object > Art object
Technique	Highlight > Painting technique > Technique > Material and technique
Geographical origin	Italy > Southern Europe > Europe

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Entry catalogue Italian Drawings 1400-1600

Author: Klazina Botke

Andrea Lilio, 'Pietà', 1596, oil on canvas, 253 x 163 cm, Museo Civico delle Cappuccine, Bagnacavallo. Photo Museo Civico delle Cappuccine, Bagnacavallo

This sheet, still attributed to Bronzino (1503-1572) by Berenson (1938), is without doubt by Andrea Lilio.^[1]Several authors appeared to discover independently of one another that it is a preliminary study for the altarpiece with a pietà in Bagnacavallo (fig.).^[2]Lilio made the painting in 1596 as a commission for the Marquise Medea Ferretti Malatesta of Ancona.^[3]She gave the work to the Capuchin Franciscans in Imola, where it was placed on the high altar of the monastery church. In 1960 Antonio Corbara rediscovered it in the former Ospizio Cronici Bedeschi in Bagnacavallo.^[4]

The study is squared so that the scene could be transferred to a larger canvas. Lilio set down the male body, leaning against a seated figure whose knees are all that can be seen, in soft black chalk with a few heavily reinforced outlines. His head has fallen against his shoulder; the weight of the lifeless body is palpable. The refined interpretation of the shadows in the body, the face and the foreshortening of the legs gives way to a less detailed rendition towards the ends of the limbs. The same figure appears twice more on the verso, but more sketchily. Here Lilio seems to have been seeking the perfect position of the legs, and also drew the thin beam on which the model in the studio could rest his feet.^[5]The abrupt cropping of the upper body clearly shows that the sheet was previously larger.

The head is shown again lower right. Here Lilio created a very subtle rendition of the face with the aid of many soft shadows and without hard outlines. Luijten (1990) noted that the lighting of the face corresponds with that in the painting in Bagnacavallo.^[6]Pulini (2003) pointed out that the very fine features could mean that the model was female and argued that Lilio reused the study of the head in his Mary Magdalene in Extasy (1606).^[7] The position, the shadows and the features do indeed strongly resemble the Magdalene’s. It would therefore seem that the artist picked up the Rotterdam drawing again almost ten years later.

Footnotes

^[1]Berenson 1938, no. 604 B. Fischer connected the study with Andrea Lilio on the basis of a similar drawing in the Willumsen Collection; Frederikssund 1988, pp. 68-69, no. 100. Luijten added that a drawing in Haarlem also fitted well stylistically; Luijten/Meij 1990, p. 193, fig. b.

^[2]Corbara in 1981, Cellini in 1992 and Pulini in 2003 (Pulini claimed to have discovered it at the same time as Cellini). See also Ward Neilson 1992, p. 187. The painting is currently in the Museo Civico delle Cappuccine in Bagnacavallo.

^[3]She was appointed by Pope Pius V as governatore generale of Ancona ‘e di tutti i castelli dell’Adriatico’, see also Pulini 2003, p. 155.

^[4]Ibidem.

^[5]Luijten/Meij 1990, p. 195, n. 10.

^[6]Ibidem, no. 70.

^[7]Pulini 2003, no. 7. See also ibidem, no. 83; Verona, private collection.

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