Studies of Figures
First half of the XVI century.Not on display
Although formerly placed as anonymous, this is a typical sheet of studies by Perino and compares well in style with the two drawings by him included in the exhibition. Unfortunately, the sheet is laid down so the studies on the verso, which partly show through the paper, are only partly decipherable. The study of the head and shoulders of a woman seen from the rear looking over her left shoulder seems to be for the spectator, who appears on the opposite side to Christ and the paralytic, in the composition of Perino´s fresco of the Pool of Bethesda, now lost, one of the scenes from a cycle, mostly still extant, painted by Perino c. 1538-39 for the Massimi Chapel in S. Trinity dei Monti, Rome. The appearance of the lost fresco is preserved in a chiaroscuro woodcut, in which Christ appears on the right and is pointing with his left hand. In a copy of the lost fresco probably based on the woodcut, also in the Prado, the female spectator is seen standing on the left of the composition.
Turner, Nicholas, From Michelangelo to Annibale Carracc: a century of Italian drawings from the Prado, Virginia, Art Services International, 2008, p.348
