The Adoration of the Golden Calf

This as yet unpublished drawing is related to Jacopo Tintoretto’s painting The Adoration of the Golden Calf in the choir of the Madonna dell’Orto, Venice (c. 1562-63).[1] It is a rather poor copy of the lower section of the vertical composition, concentrating on the main scene, leaving out the female figures sitting under a balcony just above the Golden Calf. Judging from the type of watermark, the paper dates from the 1660s, so for that reason also the drawing has nothing to do with the Tintoretto workshop and may even not be Italian. Another unpublished copy of the same section of the painting, executed in pen and brush with large washed areas and white heightening, is also in Rotterdam (inv. I 229). [Albert Elen 2020]





[1] De Vecchi 1970, no. 156 A, ill.; Pallucchini/Rossi 1982, no. 236, fig. 307; Madrid 2007, p. 90, fig. 41.