Currently not on view
The Visitation: Elizabeth Aids the Virgin to Dismount; Verso: Elizabeth Embracing the Virgin,
ca. 1632
Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri), 1591–1666; born Cento, Italy; died Bologna, Italy
x1948-745
Largely self-taught, the celebrated Baroque artist Guercino was a brilliant draftsman who produced thousands of exploratory studies for his paintings. These two sketches exemplify how he exploited economical means for maximum expression, combining elegant yet robust contours with subtly varied washes to convey the humanity of the subject matter with dramatic lighting and spatial effects. This horizontal composition is one of Guercino’s many rough drafts for the vertical altarpiece of The Visitation (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen), which depicts the mutual rejoicing of the Virgin Mary and her cousin Elizabeth over their miraculous pregnancies. Here, Guercino considers the idea (abandoned in the painting) of showing Mary dismounting from the donkey as she is about to embrace Elizabeth; their husbands Joseph and Zacharias are peripheral characters.
Information
Title
The Visitation: Elizabeth Aids the Virgin to Dismount; Verso: Elizabeth Embracing the Virgin
Dates
ca. 1632
Medium
Pen, brown ink and light gray wash on cream laid paper; verso: pen and dark brown ink
Dimensions
20 x 22.3 cm (7 7/8 x 8 3/4 in.)
Credit Line
Bequest of Dan Fellows Platt, Class of 1895
Object Number
x1948-745
- Felton Gibbons, Catalogue of Italian Drawings in The Art Museum, Princeton University, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977)., Vol. 1: p. 206, no. 674 (illustrated in Vol. 2 under the same catalog number)
- Luigi Salerno, I Dipinti del Guercino, (Rome: Ugo Bozzi Editore, 1988).
- Denis Mahon and Nicholas Turner, The drawings of Guercino in the collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle, (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
- Nicholas Turner and Carol Plazzotta, Drawings by Guercino from British collections: with an appendix describing the drawings by Guercino, his school and his followers in the British Museum, (London: Published for the Trustees of the British Museum by British Museum Press in association with Leonardo-De Luca Editori, 1991).
- David Stone, Guercino, master draftsman: works from North American collections, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Art Museum; Bologna, Italy: Nuova Alfa Editoriale, 1991)., p. 218, no. 99
- Laura Giles, Lia Markey, Claire Van Cleave, et. al., Italian Master Drawings from the Princeton University Art Museum, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2014)., p. 198, cat. no. 85; p. 199 (illus.)
