Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Hercules Standing

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
1696-1770

Hercules Standing

ca. 1718-1718
23 3/4 x 17 3/16 inches (605 x 435 mm)
Black chalk.
1981.108

Gift of Janos Scholz.

Notes
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"
Inscriptions/Markings
Watermark: letters "AFZ" with vertical bar surmounted by trefoil.
Associated names
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.
Bibliography
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.
Classification
Century Drawings
School
Department