- Museum number
- 1859,0625.551
- Description
-
A nude male figure in violent movement. 1531-3
Lead point, very faint
- Production date
- 1531-1533
- Dimensions
-
Height: 90 millimetres
-
Width: 39 millimetres
- Curator's comments
- W51, faintly drawn in lead point, represents a crouching male nude, with l. arm raised, in violent twisting movement to the left. There are pentimenti in the contour of the l. shoulder and between the legs. Wilde observes that the character of the thin, unfinished lines suggests they were to be gone over in pen and ink. He groups W51 with seven other sheets, five in the Casa Buonarroti (de Tolnay 79 83) and one each in Haarlem and Oxford (de Tolnay 341 and Parker 321 respectively - the latter sheet's ascription to Michelangelo accepted by de Tolnay but inadvertently omitted from his 'Corpus') which, with the exception of the Haarlem sheet in red chalk, mostly contain studies in pen and ink over preliminary drawings in lead point. Dussler (1959) accepts this grouping.
One of the CB sheets (de Tolnay 83) contains five small figures executed purely in lead point (as well as three gone over in pen and ink) of which the figure in the top l. is particularly close in style and technique to W51. Wilde considers these drawings to be studies for an outline drawing made by Michelangelo for the painter Giuliano Bugiardini (1475 1554) to help him with an altar piece in S. Maria Novella in Florence. This episode is recounted by Vasari and, Wilde notes, proved true by the existence of these studies. The altar piece represents the 'Martyrdom of St Catherine', Michelangelo's contribution reputedly consisting in the row of terrified soldiers in the foreground. He considers that the style of the drawings suggests a date for the drawings between 1531 2. As Wilde notes, this group of drawings is closely linked to other drawings of the period: the twisting figure of W51, for example, shares and affinity with the composition of the startled figures in the 'Resurrection' drawings especially with the outlined figure (in reverse) to the far l. in W52. For de Tolnay this is the predominant association, his citing the Resurrection drawings W52, de Tolnay 253 and 255.
J.A Gere and N. Turner (1975) consider Wilde's reference to an 'out line' drawing produced by Michelangelo for Bugiardini to be misleading: Vasari's account relates how Michelangelo sketched the outlines directly onto Bugiardini's panel so roughly that the unfortunate Bugiardini asked the sculptor Tribolo to make clay models of the figures. Gere and Turner observe that Michelangelo's spur of the moment assistance to Bugiardini did not necessarily require preparatory drawings and that there is no correspondence between the studies in this group and any of the figures in the painting. They thus consider that the most persuasive purpose for W51 is that of a study executed in relation to the Resurrection compositions.
A drawing in black chalk representing 'The Stoning of St Stephan' at Loppem Castle in Belgium has recently been attributed to Michelangelo by P. Joannides ('On Michelangelo's 'Stoning of St Stephan'', "Master Drawings", XXXIX, , Spring 2001, pp. 3-11). Although Joannides does not cite W51, the BM study is comparable in composition to St Stephan's assailants. The suggestive formal relationship between these two sheets is heightened by their contemporaneous dating to around 1530.
Lit.: J. Wilde, 'Italian Drawings in the BM, Michelangelo and his Studio', London, 1953, no. 51, pp. 86-7 (with previous literature); L. Dussler, 'Die Zeichnungen des Michelangelo', Berlin, 1959, no. 310 (apocryphally attributed to Michelangelo), p. 172; P. Barocchi, 'Michelangelo e la sua scuola: i disegni di Casa Buonarroti e degli Uffizi', Florence, 1962, I, under no. 125 (= de Tolnay 79), pp.155-8; F. Hartt, 'The Drawings of Michelangleo', London, no. 167; J.A. Gere and N. Turner, in exhib. cat., London, BM, 'Drawings by Michelangelo', 1975, no. 111, p. 90; C. de Tolnay, 'Corpus dei disegni di Michelangelo', Novara, 1976, II, no. 252 bis; C van Tuyll van Serooskerken, 'The Italian Drawings of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries in the Teyler Museum', Haarlem, Ghent and Doornspijk, 2000, under no. 61 (= de Tolnay 341), pp. 127 8
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1964, BM, Michelangelo, no. 75
1975 Feb-Apr, BM, Drawings by Michelangelo, no. 111
- Acquisition date
- 1859
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1859,0625.551