Saint Paul
Unknown Spanish, Spanish
17th century
Pen and black ink with white chalk on blue-washed laid paper
Sheet: 6 × 6 1/16 in. (15.2 × 15.4 cm)
Support: 6 1/8 × 6 3/16 in. (15.5 × 15.7 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Gift of Evelyn A. and William B. Jaffe, Class of 1964H, through Friends of the Dartmouth Library
D.962.88.8
Geography
Place Made: Spain, Europe
Period
1600-1800
Object Name
Drawing
Research Area
Drawing
On view
Inscriptions
None.
Label
A nude male with an extended torso and an outstretched arm throws his head back with an expression of agony or ecstasy. The position of the body indicates a saint’s martyrdom, thought to be the martyrdom of St. Peter, who was crucified upside down. Students in drawing academies, like the large one organized in Seville by the Spanish painter Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, created realistic figure studies based on live models. For their preparatory drawings, they used blue paper as an inexpensive, mid-toned background. Splotches and spots of beige appear because of the wash used to create the gray-toned blue color of the page.
From the 2025 exhibition Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Making Colors in Europe, 1400–1800, curated by Elizabeth Rice Mattison, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Academic Programming and Curator of European Art
Label written by Isabelle (Izzy) Lust '25, Class of 1954 Intern
Exhibition History
Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Making Colors in Europe, 1400–1800, Harrington Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, September 6, 2025 - November 14, 2026.
Provenance
Acquired by Catherine Mary Brackenbury (ca. 1818-after 1883), Cádiz, Spain, mid-19th century; sold Sotheby's, Wilkinson & Hodge, 27 February 1924, lot 7 as an album of 450 drawings; where acquired by Robert Langton Douglas, London, UK; by descent to his widow, Jean Douglas Fowles (née Stewart ) (1901–1985), London, UK and New York, NY; by whom sold Parke-Bernet, New York, 1–2 April 1952, lot 76, as part of an album of 450 drawings; where acquired by Julius H. Weitzner (1895–1986) (dealer), New York, NY; by whom sold to Evelyn Annenberg Friede Jaffe Hall (1911-2005) and William B. Jaffe (1904-1972), New York, NY, before 1956; by whom given to the present collection, 1962.
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