Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Watermark: bird on three mounts inside circle.
These sketches, made with a thick pen and employing parallel zigzag hatching, date to the 1760s and are unusual in having remained together: many of Piranesi's sheets with figure studies have been cut apart to make scraps with individual figures. The men's expressive gestures are typical of Piranesi's figure drawings and of the figures who often energize his printed views. The apron-clad man at lower right, a wonderfully expressive sketch, depicts one of the printers in Piranesi's workshop, whereas the men in long coats are probably young grand tourists or other aristocrats visiting Piranesi's studio.
A note on the back of the sheet reveals that it was from an album sold in Paris and later dispersed, which may be the source of many similar figure drawings. In the note, Scholz mentions that Francis Matthiessen owned other drawings from that set, and a misreading of the note thus identified Matthiesen as a former owner of this drawing, but Scholz acquired it from Otto Wertheimer, not Matthiesen.