Study after a Painting by Jacopino del Conte

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Drawing details

Title: Study after a Painting by Jacopino del Conte
Date: 1856
Media: Pencil on white paper
Dimensions: 22.6 x 19.9 cm
Location: Leighton House Museum
Picture credit: Leighton House Museum, The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
Reference number: LHO/D/0465
Inscriptions: Inscribed, upper right "Florence / 56" in pencil, in the artist's hand. Lower right "Michael Angelo" in pencil, partially erased. Inscribed on reverse, centre "140" encircled, in pencil. Inscribed on reverse, centre "Q25" encircled, in pencil.

Interpretation

This drawing may have been referred to for the head of Michaelangelo in the painting 'Michael Angelo Nursing his Dying Servant' (c.1862, private collection). This copy after Jacopino del Conte's unfinished portrait of Michelangelo (c.1540, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) had left Florence by the time this drawing was made. Therefore, this study was probably made from one the many copies, such as the version presented to the Uffizi Gallery by the Strozzi family in 1771.

Description

Copy of the painting 'Portrait of Michelangelo' (c.1540, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) by Jacopino del Conte (Italian painter, c.1510-1598). The head of Michaelangelo seems older and more lifelike the original painting. 

Provenance

Bequeathed by the artist to his sisters, Mrs. Augusta Matthews (n+e Augusta Neunburg Leighton, 1835-1919) and Mrs. Alexandra Orr (n+e Alexandra Leighton, 1828-1903); purchased by the Fine Art Society in 1896; presented to the Leighton House Committee by Sir Hamo Thornycroft RA (sculptor, 1850-1925) by 1897 

Bibliography

• Anon., 'Catalogue of Drawings by the late Lord Leighton Preserved for the Nation', Leighton House Committee, 1897, p.14 catalogue number 6 "Studies of Heads"
• 'Catalogue of a Collection of Studies for Pictures Designs and Sketches by the Late Lord Leighton, P.R.A.: Also a Series of Watercolour Drawings of Rome - The Tiber Valley by Onorato Carlandi ', The Fine Art Society
• Barringer, Tim and Prettejohn, Elizabeth (editors), 'Frederic Leighton Antiquity, Renaissance, Modernity', Yale University P 

Exhibition history

• April 1897 to c.1899, 'Drawings by the late Lord Leighton Preserved for the Nation', Leighton House Museum, London, catalogue number 6 (Studies of Heads)
• 08 November 2006 to 25 February 2007, 'A Victorian Master: Drawings by Frederic, Lord Leighton', Leighton House Museum, London, catalogue number 1.8