Sketch of a Man in Profile
17th Century French School
Ink on paper
Image Size: 10 1/2 x 7 inches (26.5 x 17.5 cm)
Framed
Provenance
The estate of Joseph McCrindle
Christies Old Masters and British Pictures and Old Master Drawings Sale 12th December 2008
This highly worked picture shows us a man depicted in profile is seen interacting with a scene that extends beyond the boundaries of the paper's composition, the pen strokes intricately portraying the man's face, rendering a detailed, textured complexion. He points his left hand out to something in the distance, with a look of almost alarm.
The artist Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione (1609-64) did a series of oriental head studies.
The exotic headgear that he wears and this type of oriental head studies, had its principal source was of course Rembrandt, who etched many similar heads during the 1630s.
In the seventeenth-century Western European imagination, the turbaned figure represented the epitome of alterity: the Ottoman Turk. Ottoman costume...
Category
17th Century Old Masters Bernard Meninsky Drawings and Watercolor Paintings