- Museum number
- 1895,0915.601
- Description
-
A demon throttling a kneeling man from behind, after Signorelli
Brush drawing in brown ink, over black chalk, on green-buff prepared paper, made up at top on right and left
- Production date
- 1456-1526
- Dimensions
-
Height: 357 millimetres
-
Width: 233 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Copy of a lost drawing by Signorelli for the group near the left in the fresco of the Damned at Orvieto (K der K 100).
Lit.: J.C. Robinson, 'Descriptive Catalogue of Drawings by the Old Masters, forming the Collection of John Malcolm of Poltalloch, Esq.', London, 1876, no. 164 (as Signorelli); B. Berenson, 'The Drawings of the Florentine Painters', Chicago, 1938, II, cat 2509 N, p. 337; A.E. Popham and P. Pouncey, 'Italian drawings in the BM, the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries', London, 1950, I, no. 245, II, pl. CCX (with previous literature); A. Martindale, 'Luca Signorelli and the Drawings Connected with the Orvieto Frescoes' in The Burlington Magazine, CIII, 1961, p. 220; C. Van Cleave, 'Luca Signorelli as a Draughtsman', unpublished D.Phil. diss., Oxford, 1995, cat. B6, p. 200.
Popham & Pouncey 1950
The group corresponds, except for the expression of the faces and the fact that the kneeling man is not bent so far over to the l., with one near the l. in the fresco of the 'Damned' at Orvieto (K. der K. 100). It is no doubt, as Berenson assumes, the copy of a lost drawing by Signorelli for this group. The presumed original would appear to have been elaborately finished like BB 2509 H-2, which was probably made in connection with the same fresco.
Literature: JCR 164; BB 2509 N (Gazette, vii (1932), p. 185, fig. 12); Grosvenor Gallery Winter Exhibition, 1877/8, no. 766.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1879 May-Jun, Paris, École des Beaux-Arts, 'Des Dessins de Maîtres Anciens', no. 16
- Acquisition date
- 1895
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1895,0915.601