Currently not on view
Seated male nude with arms outstretched,
ca. 1570–72
Girolamo Macchietti, Italian, 1535–1592
x1948-579
A comparison with the roughly contemporary sheet by the Venetian painter Jacopo Tintoretto exemplifies the divergent aesthetic preferences of the sixteenth-century Venetian and Florentine Schools. Macchietti’s study from a live model, possibly for a depiction of Saint Jerome in the wilderness, provides far more information about the projected painting, including the rock in his right hand and hints of the physical setting. The Florentine also took great care with hatching and the use of white chalk, creating a play of light and shadow on surfaces and reinforcing contours with sharpened red chalk. By contrast, Tintoretto was apparently satisfied with a broken contour and no interior modeling. This discrepancy sums up the Venetian fondness for colorito (coloring, including execution based on nebulous or softer outlines) and the Florentine partiality for disegno (design, typically expressed through precise modeling and contours).
More About This Object
Information
Title
Seated male nude with arms outstretched
Dates
ca. 1570–72
Maker
Medium
Red chalk, heightened with white chalk, on cream laid paper prepared with an ochre wash, squared in black chalk
Dimensions
21 × 16.8 cm (8 1/4 × 6 5/8 in.)
frame: 54.5 × 41.8 × 2.9 cm (21 7/16 × 16 7/16 × 1 1/8 in.)
Credit Line
Bequest of Dan Fellows Platt, Class of 1895
Object Number
x1948-579
Marks/Labels/Seals
Watermark: Unidentified motif (possibly mountains)
Reference Numbers
Gibbons 410
Culture
Materials
From Feinberg, “Studio to studiolo...”: suggests a date of ca. 1570-71. (See reference Bib. 4462);
- Philip Pouncey, "Contributo a Girolamo Macchietti", Bollettino d’arte 47 (1962): p. 237-340., pp. 237-238, fig. 3
- Jacob Bean, Italian drawings in the Art Museum, Princeton University; 106 selected examples, (New York: October House, 1966)., no. 11
- Janos Scholz, "Italian Drawings in the Art Museum of Princeton University," Burlington Magazine 109 no. 770 (May, 1967): p. 290-299., p. 293
- Catherine Monbeig-Goguel and Françoise Viatte, Inventaire général des dessins italiens, (Paris: Editions des Musées nationaux, 1972-)., Vol. 1: mentioned under cat. no. 362, p. 221
- Felton Gibbons, Catalogue of Italian Drawings in The Art Museum, Princeton University, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977)., Vol. 1: p. 90, no. 233 (illustrated in Vol. 2 under the same catalog number)
- Larry J. Feinberg, From studio to studiolo: Florentine draftsmanship under the first Medici grand dukes, (Oberlin, OH: Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College; Seattle, WA: Distributed by University of Washington Press, 1991).
- 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. 59, cat. no. 24; p. 60 (illus.) (verso illus.)
