Study of an Atlas Figure

Author: Albert Elen

This is one of fifteen sheets of studies by Tintoretto and his workshop assistants after a reduced-sized sculpture of Atlas, observed from various angles. If complete, the unclad figure would have been supporting the celestial sphere on his shoulders and holding a stick in his right hand, but these common attributes are missing in the drawings and may likewise have been absent in the sculptural model if it was made of wax or terracotta.^[1] Anyhow, Tintoretto was only interested in the main figure to study the pose and anatomical details. Two of the preserved sheets, including the most impressive of all, are also from the Koenigs Collection, but since the Second World War have been part of the separated group now in Moscow, awaiting restitution to the Netherlands.^[2] The model is believed to have been a statuette formerly attributed to Jacopo Sansovino (1486-1570), now also in Moscow, holding the stick but without the globe.^[3] However, there are slight discrepancies in the details between the drawings and this sculpture. Another statuette, a gilt bronze (without the stick but with a globe as a later addition) now in London, is closer to the drawings and Tintoretto’s model, but it could not have served as such, as it was made much later, around 1600.^[4]

A third statuette that recently surfaced on the art market, labelled ‘North Italian late-16^th century’, shows the same figure without his attributes.^[5] Sotheby’s auction catalogue entry correctly states that the three statuettes all appear to relate to the small fragmentary wax model labelled ‘after Michelangelo’ in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (BEK 1124).^[6]

From the inventory of his workshop, drafted after his death in 1594, we know Tintoretto owned a wax bozzetto (model) of an Atlas figure, which might very well be the Rotterdam piece.^[7] This malleable material would have allowed the artist to modify details of the figure, such as the position of the arms, in order to create alternative poses and enhance the dramatic effect. One disadvantage of a wax model, however, is that it is vulnerable, as evidenced by the Rotterdam figure which in the course of time has lost the lower legs and both arms. As a result, until recently it was no longer recognized as an Atlas, but considered a recumbent river god, related to Michelangelo’s unexecuted model planned for the Medici tomb in the Sacrestia Nuova in the San Lorenzo, Florence.

Our drawing was listed among the autograph drawings of Jacopo by Tietze/Tietze-Conrat (1944), but was rejected by Rossi (1975) who later labelled it ‘school’ (2007). According to Marciari it is ‘not the most competent studio exercise’, with which we agree.^[8]