Life drawing has long been regarded as fundamental to artistic training. This monumental sheet was created toward the beginning of the artist's long and immensely successful career, probably about 1718-20. The forceful modeling of the nude figure relates it to works by Giovanni Battista Piazzetta, who exercised a profound influence on the young Giambattista Tiepolo. While academic studies of this type are sometimes related to paintings, their primary purpose was didactic. --Exhibition Label, from "Tiepolo, Guardi, and Their World: Eighteenth-Century Venetian Drawings"
Watermark: letters "AFZ" with vertical bar surmounted by trefoil.
Saint-Saphorin, Armand-François-Louis de Mestral de, 1738-1805, former owner.
Cérenville, René de, former owner.
Bovet, Alfred, b. 1859, former owner.
Scholz, János, former owner.
Burnand, Eugène, 1850-1921, former owner.
Scholz, János, former owner.
Ryskamp, Charles, ed. Twentieth Report to the Fellows of the Pierpont Morgan Library, 1981-1983. New York : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1984, p. 303.
Aikema, Bernard. Tiepolo and His Circle : Drawings in American Collections. Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Art Museum ; New York : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1996, no. 4, repr.