Carpaccio is known primarily for his large series of paintings, such as those in the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni in Venice,
the headquarters of a brotherhood of Venetians from Dalmatia. There he painted a famous series of seven scenes from the lives of the patron saints of the Scuola, including St George, St Augustine and St Jerome. This drawing is a preparatory study for one of the monks in ‘The Burial of St Jerome’., Carpaccio is best known for his large series of paintings, especially those
in the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni in Venice, the headquarters
of a brotherhood of Venetians who originated in Dalmatia. There he
painted a famous series of seven stories of the patron Saints of the
Scuola, including Saint Augustine of Hippo and Saint Jerome. This
drawing is a preparatory study for one of the monks in ‘The Funeral of
Saint Jerome’.
Specifications
| Title | Study of a Kneeling Monk Holding a Taper |
|---|---|
| Material and technique | Black chalk, heightened with white, on blue paper (recto and verso) |
| Object type |
Drawing
> Two-dimensional object
> Art object
|
| Location | This object is travelling |
| Dimensions |
Height 194 mm Width 140 mm |
|---|---|
| Artists |
Draughtsman:
Vittore Carpaccio
|
| Accession number | MB 1940/T 7 recto (PK) |
| Credits | Loan Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (former Koenigs collection), 1940 |
| Department | Drawings & Prints |
| Acquisition date | 1940 |
| Creation date | in circa 1502 |
| Watermark | none (vH, ?P) |
| Mark | J.P. Heseltine (L.1507) |
| Provenance | Silvestro Bonfiglioli (1637-1696), Bologna; Bartolommeo Bonfiglioli, Bologna-Venice; sold by his heirs to Zaccaria Sagredo between 1727 and 1728; Zaccaria Sagredo (1653-1729, L.2103a = inv. no. missing), Venice (inserted in an album); Sagredo's albums sold by his heirs to Consul John Udny in 1763 and brought to England by him; Earls of Sunderland (in one of four Sagredo albums); by inheritance to George Charles Spencer Churchill, 8th Duke of Marlborough, Blenheim Palace, Woodstock; his sale, London (Christie) 15.06.1883, probably in lot 114 (after Carpaccio, BP 6/16/6 to Thibaudeau); John Postle Heseltine (1843-1929, L.1507), London; art dealer P. & D. Colnaghi & Obach, Londen (1912); Henry Oppenheimer (1859-1932, L.1351), Londen, acquired in in 1912; his sale London (Christie's) 10-14.07.1936, lot 53, pl. 14 (to Cassirer); Franz W. Koenigs (1881-1941, L.1023a), Haarlem, acquired in 1936 and presented to Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in 1940 |
| Exhibitions | Amsterdam 1953, no. T 15; Venice/Florence 1985, no. 13; Rotterdam 1987, no. 13; Rotterdam 2010 (coll 2 kw 7); Rotterdam (Rondom Fra B.) 2016 |
| Internal exhibitions |
De Collectie Twee - wissel VII, Prenten & Tekeningen (2010) Rondom Fra Bartolommeo (2016) |
| Research |
Show research Italian Drawings 1400-1600 |
| Literature | Heseltine 1906, no. 7, ill.; Von Hadeln 1925a, p. 58, ill. 19, 20; Fiocco 1931, p. 72, pl. 102a-b; Parker 1936, no. 53, pl. 14; Van Marle 1923-38, vol. 19 (1938), p. 338; Fiocco 1942, p. 72; Tietze/Tietze-Conrat 1944, pp. 146, 153, no. 620; Amsterdam 1953, no. T 15, pl. 61; Fiocco 1958, p. 29, no. 7; Lauts 1962, pp. 30, 276-77, nr. 47, pl. 88, 98; Pignatti 1963, p. 53; Muraro 1966, p. 110; Perocco 1967, p. 98; Pignatti 1972, p. 13; Muraro 1977, p. 75, figs. 19, 95 (recto Carpaccio, verso follower); Ames-Lewis 1981, p. 145, ill. 142; Aikema/Meijer 1985, nr. 13, ill.; Ruggeri 1985, p. 235; Rotterdam 1987, no. 13; Elen 1989, pp. 14, 24 n. 16; Rotterdam/New York/Cleveland 1990, p. 155 n. 9 under no. 55; Ter Molen 1993, p. 195, no. 18 (verso), ill.; Elen 2004, pp. 13, 25, n. 6; Washington/Venice 2022, p. 190, under no. 35, fig. 3 |
| Material | |
| Object | |
| Technique |
Highlight
> Painting technique
> Technique
> Material and technique
|
| Place of manufacture | Venice > Veneto region > Italy > Southern Europe > Europe |
| Geographical origin | Italy > Southern Europe > Europe |
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Entry catalogue Italian Drawings 1400-1600
Author: Rhoda Eitel-Porter
One of the foremost artists in early Renaissance Venice, Carpaccio is best remembered for his lively narrative cycles for Venetian confraternities, or scuole, including his series of paintings for the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni. The drawing on the recto is a study for one of the kneeling monks behind the bier in the scene of the Obsequies of St Jerome (fig.) painted in 1502, which is part of the cycle commissioned by the scuola for their oratory.[1] A design for the complete composition in pen and ink in Uppsala is thought to predate the Rotterdam figure study.[2] Here the figure does not yet place his hand beneath his garment as in the Rotterdam study and the final painting. In the earlier moment represented by the Uppsala study, our figure was especially prominent, kneeling nearly isolated at the centre of the composition, with a large gap either side and a ridiculously tall palm tree leading the eye to him like a lightning rod. In the painted version, however, the palm tree was moved sideways out of this direct alignment and the monk shares the limelight with a close companion on his left.
A surprisingly high number of other drawings have been associated with the Obsequies of St Jerome and other paintings in the cycle. The monk holding the crucifix at the right might have been based on an earlier drawing, now in Florence[3] and a number of background figures wearing turbans seem to have been lifted from a sheet of studies in Paris.[4] In an insightful article of 2004 Caroline Brooke elaborated on Carpaccio’s working method, demonstrating how the artist designed full compositions but also drew separate studies for prominent individual figures as well as relying on sheets of studies with a stock repertoire of motifs. He would occasionally focus on the setting and leave the figures that were to be studied separately in sketchy outline form only, as for instance in the Uppsala drawing or The Vision of St Augustine in London,[5] a preparatory study also for a painting in the Oratorio di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni. Carpaccio was also among the first to draw extensively on blue paper, using the colour of the paper as a midtone, between the black chalk and white highlights, a support and technique which came to be considered quintessentially Venetian.
The verso of the Rotterdam drawing appears somewhat dry and derivative in comparison to the convincingly articulated figure on the recto. It shows the Child in lively movement on the lap of his mother, grappling with her arm, but the rest of the figure of the Virgin has been omitted. Lauts loosely associated the drawing with the painting Sacra Conversazione in Avignon, of c.1500-10,[6] yet there is only a vague correspondence and the Child is similar to the infant Christ in a number of religious paintings for which Carpaccio was justly famous.[7] The verso study is likely by a member of the workshop.[8]
Footnotes
[1] The connection with the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni painting was first made by Heseltine in 1906.
[2] Uppsala University Library, inv. 6642; Tietze/Tietze-Conrat 1944, p. 155, no. 636, pl. xix; Brooke 2004, p. 305, fig. 3; Humfrey 2005, p. 89, no. 23, ill.
[3] Gallerie degli’Uffizi, inv. 1696F; noted by Brooke 2004, p. 306 and note 16.
[4] Musée du Louvre, Rothschild Collection, inv. 765 DR verso. Muraro 1977, pp. 71-72, figs. 64 and 65; Brooke 2004, p. 306, figs. 6 and 7.
[5] British Museum, inv. 1934,1208.1. Brooke 2004, p. 304.
[6] Musée du Petit Palais, inv. MI 548; the painting was formerly in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Caen.
[7] Lauts 1962, p. 276.
[8] Muraro 1977, p. 75; Aikema/Meijer 1985, p. 32, both ‘forse materiale di repertorio’.
