Drawings Notebook
Many drawings which are preserved in the collections at Venice, Lille, and Oxford, show us with what care Raphael prepared his work. More than once, when hurried or fatigued, he had to be contented with sketching in the fewest of lines the object he wished to fix in his memory. Yet even at a time when he might have been excused for hurrying over his work we find him faithful to the principles of accuracy which governed his youth. His studies for the Holy Family of Francis I are a proof of this. As of old, he poses a living model and reproduces him or her with a scientific exactness and realism that is but rarely to be found in a champion of the ideal; he afterwards commences to refine and to ennoble, in a word, to compose his picture. The process, indeed, has changed; at first the artist’s timid and tentative sketches were done in silver-point; then came the period of those exact and vigorous drawings in pen and ink, of which the studies for The Entombment, and for so many other inimitable works, are happily still preserved. After his arrival in Rome he found this method too slow; he then made use of red chalk, which allowed him to give importance to his leading lines at the expense of detail. Thenceforward he preferred this material for studies of single figures, reserving colour-washes for those of groups. Sometimes he had recourse to Italian chalk. But, although the instrument varied, the method remained the same.
Sketch for an Enthroned Virgin and Child with St Nicholas of Tolentino, c. 1503-1504. Pen and brown ink, some lines in black chalk, traces of stylus, 23.3 x 15.4 cm. Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main.
The Holy Family with St John the Baptist and an Angel, c. 1504. Pen and ink, 16.7 x 15.9 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Study for the Coronation of St Nicholas of Tolentino, 1500-1501. Black chalk over stylus, 39.4 x 24.9 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Head of a Boy with a Cap, date unknown. Black chalk, 21.2 x 18.6 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Study for the Coronation of St Nicholas of Tolentino, 1500-1501. Black chalk and white highlights on grey-brown paper, 40.9 x 26.5 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Study for Presentation in the Temple, date unknown. Pen and brown ink with graphite on off-white paper, 20 x 20 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study of two apostles for the Oddi Altarpiece, c. 1503. Black chalk, 23.4 x 18.5 cm. Windsor Castle, Royal Collection Trust, London.
Study for St George, date unknown. Pen, traces of black chalk, 26.6 x 26.7 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Kneeling Figure of a Youth, study for The Mond Crucifixion, date unknown. Silverpoint on a white preparation, 26.5 x 18.4 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Young Man Making Music, study for the Oddi Altarpiece (one of two pages), date unknown. Silverpoint heightened with bodycolour, on a pale stone-grey preparation, 19.1 x 12.7 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Battle Scene with Prisoners Being Pinioned, date unknown. Pen and brown ink over faint indications in black chalk on blue-grey paper, 26.8 x 41.7 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study for The Annunciation, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, black chalk, and stylus, 28.5 x 42.3 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for The Virgin and Child with St Elizabeth and the Infant St John in a Landscape, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, and preparatory traces in chalk, 22.3 x 18.6 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
St George and the Dragon, date unknown. Brush and brown ink heightened with white over black chalk, incised with stylus, 24.5 x 20.3 cm. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Study for The Adoration of the Magi, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, 27.2 x 42 cm. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm.
Study for The Massacre of the Innocents, 1498-1520. Pen and brown ink over traces of red chalk, 23.1 x 37.4 cm. British Museum, London.
Study for The Entombment, 1506. Pen and brown ink, over black chalk and stylus, 22.8 x 31.8 cm. British Museum, London.
Madonna and Child with St John (recto), 1506-1507. Red chalk, 22.4 x 15.8 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Study of a Nude Male (verso), 1506-1507. Pen and brown ink, 22.4 x 15.8 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Composition of Ten Figures, study for The Entombment, date unknown. Pen and brown ink on white paper, 17.9 x 20.6 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study for The Entombment, date unknown. Pen and brown ink on buff paper, 21.8 x 30.7 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study for the central group of The Entombment, date unknown. Pen and traces of black chalk, 28.9 x 29.8 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
The Lamentation over Dead Christ, study for The Entombment, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, black chalk over traces of stylus, 33.5 x 39.7 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for St Bernard from the Madonna del Baldacchino, date unknown. Pen, ink wash, white gouache, and black chalk, 21.7 x 13.2 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Study for La Belle Jardinière, date unknown. Pen, brown ink, and stylus, 23.3 x 16.6 cm. Musée Condé, Chantilly.
Sts Peter and Paul Appear to Attila and Leo the Great, c. 1512-1514. Brush and brown wash over traces of metalpoint, 36.2 x 59.2 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for Liberation of St Peter, date unknown. Pen, brown wash, black chalk, and highlights with gouache, 25.7 x 41.7 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Christ and the Saints in Glory, study for the upper section of the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, 1508-1511. Brush drawing in brown ink, heightened with white body colour and with touches of pinkish wash of a later date, 23.3 x 40 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Project for the lower section of the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, 1508-1511. Pen and brown wash, white highlights over traces of black chalk, 23.1 x 40.7 cm. Musée Condé, Chantilly.
Study for Battle of Constantine against Maxentius, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, and white highlights over metalpoint, 37.6 x 85.6 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Cartoon for the School of Athens, date unknown. Black and white chalk and gouache, 285 x 804 cm. Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, Milan.
Two Men Conversing on a Flight of Steps, and a Head Shouting, study for the School of Athens, date unknown. Silverpoint, heightened with white body colour, on a pale pink preparation, with much oxidation, 27.8 x 20 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study for the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, c. 1509. Brown wash and white highlights over silverpoint, 28 x 28.5 cm. Windsor Castle, Royal Collection Trust, London.
Study for the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, date unknown. Pen and brown ink over traces of metalpoint, 36 x 23.5 cm. Musée Fabre, Montpellier.
Study for the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, date unknown. Pen and brown ink over traces of metalpoint, 36 x 23.5 cm. Musée Fabre, Montpellier.
Nude Man Seated Playing the ‘Lira da Braccio’, study for Apollo in the Parnassus, c. 1509-1511. Pen and ink over graphite, 34.9 x 23.8 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Studies for Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, 1509-1511. Pen and brown ink, 31.1 x 20.8 cm. J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
Pythagoras and His Disciples, study for the School of Athens, 1510. Silverpoint and white highlights on grey, prepared paper, 28.7 x 39.7 cm. Grafische Sammlung, Albertina, Vienna.
Project for the lower left section of the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, 1498-1520. Pen and brown ink, with grey-brown wash, heightened with white, 24.5 x 40 cm. British Museum, London.
Study for The Alba Madonna, date unknown. Red chalk and pen, 42.2 x 27.2 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
Study sheet, in the middle: The Alba Madonna, date unknown. Red chalk, 42.2 x 27.2 cm. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Lille.
A Marble Horse on the Quirinal Hill (recto), c. 1513. Red chalk and pen and brown ink, with stylus underdrawing and traces of leadpoint on laid paper, 21.9 x 27.4 cm. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Architectural Details and a Soldier (verso), c. 1513. Pen and brown ink on laid paper, 21.9 x 27.4 cm. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Study for The Madonna with a Fish, 1513-1514. Red pencil over traces of black pencil, stylus on the left, 22.7 x 26.3 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Moses Receiving the Tablets of the Law, 1517. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, white highlights, preparatory tracing in black chalk, traces of red chalk; black chalk squaring, 25.5 x 27.9 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for Christ’s Charge to Peter, date unknown. Pen and brown ink, brown wash, white highlights, and black chalk, 22.2 x 35.4 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for Paul Preaching at Athens, date unknown. Red chalk over traces of stylus, 27.8 x 41.8 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Moses, study for The Burning Bush, c. 1514. Black chalk with white highlights on paper, 140 x 138 cm. Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte, Naples.
Study for Christ’s Charge to Peter, date unknown. Red chalk over traces of stylus, 25.3 x 13.4 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study for the Figure of God the Father, for the central oculus in the dome of the Chigi Chapel, date unknown. Red chalk on off-white paper, 21.4 x 20.9 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Study for The Holy Family of Francis I, date unknown. Red chalk and pencil on paper, 27 x 20.9 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
Virgin, the Infant Jesus, and the Folds of the Virgin’s Dress, study for The Holy Family of Francis I, 1518. Red chalk over traces of stylus on paper, 17.3 x 12 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Raphael or Giulio Romano (?), The Virgin and Infant Jesus, study for The Holy Family of Francis I, 1518. Red chalk over traces of stylus on paper, 17.3 x 12 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Study of the Head of an Apostle, date unknown. Black chalk, 37.5 x 27.8 cm. Devonshire Collection, Chatsworth.
