Description:

brush and brown ink with white, yellow and grey bodycolour, over traces of black chalk on golden brown prepared paper
280 x 435 mm

Provenance:

Count Gustaf Adolf Sparre (1746-1794), Stockholm (Lugt 2719)
Count Jacob Gustaf de la Gardie (1768-1842), Stockholm (Lugt 2722a)
Pontus Hendrik de la Gardie (1805-1880)
Johan de la Gardie (1851-1895)
Pontus de la Gardie (1884-1969), Borrestad, Sweden
Thence by descent

Note:

Amico Aspertini is rightly considered the pre-eminent artist of the High Renaissance in Bologna. The present drawing is one of the finest examples of his graphic work in scale, ambition and state of preservation. He was born c.1473, a contemporary of Michelangelo and ten years older than Raphael. He made his first trip to Rome in 1496, and again in 1500-03, at a time of passionate interest in the re-discovery of Roman antiquity among aristocratic, intellectual circles. In this drawing, the worlds of classicism and fantastic naturalism combine in an imaginative tour de force.

SOLD