GIROLAMO FRANCESCO MARIA MAZZOLA, called PARMIGIANINO

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• The Christ Child (study for The Vision of St. Jerome) 1526–27
  
  red chalk (recto), pen and brown ink (verso); 143 x 100 mm
  
  

  PROVENANCE
  Peter Lely (1618–1680), London (Lugt 2092; stamped on the verso)
  Jonathan Richardson, Sr.. (1665–1745), London (his stamp Lugt 2184; his shelf marks in pen and ink A.29 / B.B. 22 20 / A.A.35 / B / A) on the verso of the mount
  Sir Francis Ferrand Foljambe (1750–1814), Osberton Hall, Scofton near Worksop, Nottinghamshire;
  thence by descent

  LITERATURE
  Hugo Chapman, [review of] Parmigianino. The Drawings. By Sylvie Beguin, Mario Di Giampaolo and Mary Vaccaro, in: The Burlington Magazine, July 2002, p. 138 fig. 55
  Achim Gnann, Parmigianino: Die Zeichnungen, 2 vols., Petersberg 2007, vol. 1, p. 160, and p. 440, no. 569, and vol. 2, p. 451, no. 569r and v (reproduced before full revelation of verso)

  The red chalk study on the recto of this sheet is for the Christ Child in Parmigianino’s altarpiece of the Virgin and Child with Saints John the Baptist and Jerome (traditionally titled The Vision of Saint Jerome), now in the National Gallery in London, which—as Vasari so grippingly relates—was the work the artist was engaged upon when the Sack of Rome erupted around him in 1527. Both the basic pose of the Child and the fact that the drawing is lit from the right confirm its connection with the altarpiece, although here—uniquely among all the surviving drawings for the work—he is shown cradling a dove in his hands, a detail absent from the finished work. The Child’s right arm is shown in two alternative positions, both outstretched—as in the altarpiece—and bent across his chest to hold the dove. —David Ekserdjian

  The three disparate sketches in pen and brown ink on the verso do not allow for an easy interpretation. The fragmentary, but closely observed and detailed study of a leg may be compared to an equally enigmatic etching by the artist showing a disembodied arm which survives in a unique impression at the British Museum (inv. no. 1864,7.18.82). The central sketch, a male nude covered by a dense web strokes, is even more puzzling—perhaps John the Baptist draped in his hairy mantle? Thematically this would link the verso to the same altarpiece as the study of the Christ Child on the recto. A drawing of a lying male nude at the Getty Museum (inv. no. 84.GA.9) helps to understand the third sketch of a male figure on the right: if one turns the drawing halfway to the side one realizes that the sketch represents a prima idea for the figure of the sleeping Saint Jerome in the altarpiece—the position of his arms gets further developed in the Getty drawing and his right arm ultimately disappears in the final painting which also has a cloth chastely draped across the saint’s loins.

• The Christ Child (study for The Vision of St. Jerome) 1526–27
  Verso