Drawings
A male nude seen from behind ©
Drawing was central to the practice of almost all Italian artists of the Renaissance and Baroque. In this section of the exhibition can be seen compositional sketches, life studies, designs for altarpieces, frescoes, prints, tapestries, woodwork, sculpture and architecture, models for the approval of patrons, and drawings produced as works of art in their own right.
The most common drawing materials of the fifteenth century had been metalpoint (a silver stylus on prepared paper) and pen and ink. Metalpoint was supplanted around 1500 by natural red and black chalks, and over the next two centuries artists frequently used combinations of coloured grounds, chalk, pen and ink, washes of dilute ink, and white highlights, to create drawings of great sophistication and beauty.
Historically, relatively few collectors, and only two British monarchs, have shown a serious interest in old master drawings. Charles II seems to have acquired most of the Renaissance drawings now in the Royal Collection; and George III acquired almost all of the Baroque drawings, most notably through the purchase in 1762 of the collections of both Consul Joseph Smith in Venice, and Cardinal Alessandro Albani in Rome.
Also present are some of the Royal Library's notable books and bindings of the period.
Lodovico Carracci (Bologna 1555-Bologna 1619)
A seated male nude
Agostino Carracci (Bologna 1557-Parma 1602)
The Adoration of the Shepherds
Annibale Carracci (Bologna 1560-Rome 1609)
A cartoon of a putto with a cornucopia
Annibale Carracci (Bologna 1560-Rome 1609)
Polyphemus
Bartolomeo Schedoni (1566-1616)
A beggar
Girolamo Muziano (1528-92)
St Jerome
Domenichino (Bologna 1581-Naples 1641)
The Flagellation of St Andrew
Guido Reni (Bologna 1575-Bologna 1642)
An angel with a violin
Guido Reni (Bologna 1575-Bologna 1642)
The head of Christ
Lodovico Carracci (Bologna 1555-Bologna 1619)
The Martyrdom of St Ursula
Lorenzo Garbieri (1580-1654)
San Carlo Borromeo interceding for the cessation of the plague
Pier Francesco Mazzucchelli called Morazzone (1571-1626)
The Presentation of the Virgin
Rutilio Manetti (1571-1639)
St Gerard in ecstasy
Giovanni Francesco Barbieri known as Guercino (Cento 1591-Bologna 1666)
A recumbent male nude
Giovanni Francesco Barbieri known as Guercino (Cento 1591-Bologna 1666)
Composition study for The Burial and Reception into Heaven of St Petronilla
Francesco Borromini (1599-1667)
A design for the upper half of a column
Pietro da Cortona (Cortona 1596-Rome 1669)
A design for a Quarantore
Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665)
The saving of the infant Pyrrhus
Codex Ursinianus Copyist (active c. 1625)
Roman banquet
Vincenzo Leonardi (1590-c. 1648)
A Roman steelyard balance (statera)
Andrea Sacchi (1599-1661)
The Three Magdalenes
Giovanni Lanfranco (1582-1647)
The Martyrdom of St Thomas
Pietro Testa (1607/11-50)
Midas
Pier Francesco Mola (1612-66)
Bacchus and Ariadne
Sassoferrato (1609-85)
The Mystic Marriage of St Catherine
Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680)
A male nude seen from behind
Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680)
A study for a fountain of Neptune
Giovanni Angelo Canini (1617-66)
A male nude seen from below
Claude Gellée, called Le Lorrain (1604/5-82)
Acis and Galatea
Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione (1609-64)
Circe
Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione (1609-64)
The head of an oriental
Giovanni Andrea Sirani (1610-70)
The Madonna and Child with saints
Giovanni Paolo Schor (1615-1674)
An interior design for Pope Alexander VII
Filippo Lauri (Rome 1623-Rome 1694)
A ceiling design for Palazzo Borghese
Giovanni Battista Gaulli (1639-1709)
The Sacrifice of Noah
Domenico Maria Canuti (1620-84)
An allegory of Divine and Human Wisdom
Giovanni Battista Beinaschi (1636-88)
A prophet
Carlo Maratta (1625-Rome 1713)
St John expounding the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception
Carlo Maratta (1625-Rome 1713)
A study for the Prophet Balaam
Daniel Saiter (1649-1705)
Diana and Endymion
Domenico Piola (1627-1703)
A woman offering a thesis to a personification of Liguria
Giovan Gioseffo Dal Sole (1654-1719)
Susannah and the Elders
Attributed to Francesco Colonna (1432-33-c. 1527)
Hypnerotomachia Poliphili
Homer (active 850 BC?)
Iliad
Antonio Labacco (1495?-1567)
Libro d'Antonio Labacco appartenente a l'architecttura nel qual si figuraro alcune notabili antiquita di Roma
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (c. 80 BC-after 15 BC)
I dieci libri dell’architettura
Giorgio Vasari (Arezzo 1511-74)
Delle vite de’ più eccellenti pittori scultori et architettori
Ovid (43 BC-17 AD)
Ovid's Metamorphoses and the Argonautica of Valerius Flaccus
Ovid (43 BC-17 AD)
Le Metamorfosi
Julius Caesar (100-44 BC)
Commentarii
Pietro Bembo (1470-1547)
Historiae Venetae libri XII
Antonio Mocenigo (active 1522)
Commissione for Antonio Mocenigo on his appointment as Procurator
Giovanni Sagredo (1617-82)
Memorie istoriche de’ monarchi ottomani
Torquato Tasso (1544-95)
La Gerusalemme liberata
Gaetano Piccini (1700-50)
Volume of drawings of bas-reliefs
Venice : Giunta
Psalterium Romanum
Giovanni Battista Marinella (late 17th century)
Descriptions of Poussin’s original designs & sketches
Raffaello Soprani (1612-72)
Le vite de pittori scoltori et architetti genovesi
Carlo Cesare Malvasia (1616-93)
Felsina pittrice : vite de’ pittori bolognesi
Giovanni Pietro Bellori (1613-96)
Le vite de pittori, scultori, et architetti moderni
Giovanni Baglione (1566-1643)
