Design for an Aedicule with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist

Artist Aurelio Luini (Italian, ca. 1530 - 1593)

Date16th century

MediumBrown ink and wash over black chalk, heightened with white, on faded blue paper

DimensionsUnframed: 10 1/16 x 6 3/16 inches (25.56 x 15.72 cm)
Framed: 21 x 17 x 1 1/4 inches (53.34 x 43.18 x 3.18 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: acquired through the generosity Mr. and Mrs. Milton McGreevy through the Westport Fund

Object numberF67-24

On View

Not on view

Collections

European Art

Terms

Exhibition History

Master Drawings from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, Washington University Gallery of Art, Saint Louis, MO, September 22-December 3, 1989, unnumbered, as Design for an Aedicular Altar with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

Dürer to Matisse: Master Drawings from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, The Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK, June 23-August 18, 1996; The Cummer Museum and Gardens, Jacksonville, FL, September 20-November 29, 1996; The Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, December 21, 1996-March 2, 1997, no. 12, as Design for an Aedicule with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

Dürer to Matisse: Master Drawings from the Permanent Collection, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, July 12-September 6, 1998, no cat., as Design for an Aedicule with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

Religious Subjects: A Variety of Approaches, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, June 8-October 16, 2011, no cat., as Design for an Aedicule with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

Saints & Sinners, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, January 15-December 13, 2020.

Gallery Label

Aurelio Luini came from a family of artists in Milan. This drawing may be a preparatory study for an unidentified altar in a church where a statue of the saint was to be placed in a niche. The application of delicate washes to create shadow and the use of white body color to mark the highlights make the figure stand out from its surroundings.

Provenance

Giuseppe Vallardi (1784-1863), Milan, by 1863 [1];

Carl Robert Rudolf (1884-1975), London, by 1967 [2];

Purchased from Zeitlin and VerBrugge Booksellers, Los Angeles, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1967.

NOTES:

[1] Lugt 1223

[2] Lugt 2811b

Published References

Roger Ward and Mark S. Weil, Master Drawings from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, exh. cat. (St. Louis, MO: Washington University Gallery of Art, 1989), 8, 19, (repro.), as Design for an Aedicular Altar with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

Roger Ward, Dürer to Matisse: Master Drawings from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, exh. cat. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1996), 64-65, (repro.), as Design for an Aedicule with a Statue (?) of Saint John the Baptist.

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