DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61668#0228
146 POLLAIUOLO
peculiar shape, with rectangular sides and curved
front, a form followed in four out of the seven
paintings.
At first sight, in studying the photograph only, the
heavy expression of the face makes the attribution of
the drawing to the energetic Verrocchio difficult to
accept, but in the original it will be seen that this is
due to coarse pen-strokes outlining the features, an
addition by some later hand. The lines of the eyelids
and eyebrows thus drawn over, give an owl-like
expression to the face, which in other respects has
everything in common with Verrocchio’s type, the same
bombe forehead and square jaw, the same wide-winged
nose, round nostrils, and curved mouth, that we find in
the female head in the Malcolm Collection of the
British Museum, in the drawing of the head of an
Angel in the Uffizi, and in the reclining Venus of the
same collection. The figure is constructed also in
Verrocchio’s manner, with broad, flat chest, fine pro-
portions, and with his peculiar feeling for bone. The
draperies are arranged in folds which closely resemble
those of the Christ in the group of Or S. Michele, on
which it will be remembered he was at work at the same
date as the competition for the Virtues.
So much for the superficial resemblances of form and
feature, which might have been imitated by his followers.
The fine quality of the drawing can be appreciated only
in the original. The firm touch, the rounded modelling
obtained by the slightest wash, the fine proportions of
the figure, so different to the long ungainly bodies of
peculiar shape, with rectangular sides and curved
front, a form followed in four out of the seven
paintings.
At first sight, in studying the photograph only, the
heavy expression of the face makes the attribution of
the drawing to the energetic Verrocchio difficult to
accept, but in the original it will be seen that this is
due to coarse pen-strokes outlining the features, an
addition by some later hand. The lines of the eyelids
and eyebrows thus drawn over, give an owl-like
expression to the face, which in other respects has
everything in common with Verrocchio’s type, the same
bombe forehead and square jaw, the same wide-winged
nose, round nostrils, and curved mouth, that we find in
the female head in the Malcolm Collection of the
British Museum, in the drawing of the head of an
Angel in the Uffizi, and in the reclining Venus of the
same collection. The figure is constructed also in
Verrocchio’s manner, with broad, flat chest, fine pro-
portions, and with his peculiar feeling for bone. The
draperies are arranged in folds which closely resemble
those of the Christ in the group of Or S. Michele, on
which it will be remembered he was at work at the same
date as the competition for the Virtues.
So much for the superficial resemblances of form and
feature, which might have been imitated by his followers.
The fine quality of the drawing can be appreciated only
in the original. The firm touch, the rounded modelling
obtained by the slightest wash, the fine proportions of
the figure, so different to the long ungainly bodies of