WORKSHOP OF ANNIBALE CARRACCI (Bologna, 1560 - Rome, 1609)

The beaneater

Sanguine on ...

WORKSHOP OF ANNIBALE CARRACCI (Bologna, 1560 - Rome, 1609)

The beaneater

Sanguine on paper, cm. 18,5x24

The drawing was refered to Annibale Carracci's workshop by Prof. Daniele Benati in an email communication to the owner on 03/09/2020.
This red pencil drawing has obvious reasons of interest. It is certainly an ancient sheet of excellent quality, executed with a loose, quick and safe hand. The drawing is unequivocally connected with the famous Beaneater a masterpiece of the more naturalist phase by Annibale Carracci today at the Galleria Colonna in Rome, but it cannot be considered a simple copy. It shows actually conspicuous variants compared to the prototype that invest the composition, here further compressed, the perspective setting, with the displacement of the observation point and the consequent modification of the table and the window in the background, and finally the protagonist's clothing: the open shirt of the Colonna painting is replaced, in fact, by a jacket closed with the two upper buttons clearly visible. Finally, it remains to note a certain connection that our paper also presents with the Beaneater today at the Art Museum in Allentown (whose reference to Hannibal's hand remains controversial), in particular in the farmer's straw hat. On the reverse, faint traces of a drawing that seems to outline a face in profile.
Extensive lacks and small lacerations at the edges.
PROVENANCE: Private collection, Umbria.

Extensive lacks and small lacerations at the edges.