Raphael, Studies for the figure of Christ, c.1507, pen and brown ink over leadpoint, 28.5 x 16.2 cm. Presented by Chambers Hall in 1855, Ashmolean Museum WA1855.91.
Over sketchy guidelines in leadpoint Raphael built up this vigorous pen and ink drawing of a standing child. With a twisting movement he leans upwards and to the right, while a hastily drawn loop around his head creates a halo. Raphael’s main concern, as can be seen from the insistent outlining with a nib heavy with ink, was to establish the graceful contours created by the counterbalanced legs as the child shifts its weight. The details of the left foot get lost in the lavish shading that establishes the precise ratio at which the right foot and leg stand proud of the flexing left leg, fundamental for the dynamic thrust of the pose. Yet Raphael was reluctant to abandon any precision in delineating the left foot – as can be seen from a sequence of four further drawings, each on a different scale and each proposing a possible solution to the problem. External hatching around the second foot from the bottom, which overlaps with the foot beneath it, suggests that he chose this as the preferred design.
A nice detail, perhaps a moment of wry humour given the obsessive concern over the left foot, is the way in which the Child’s right hand vanishes into a drapery fold as if into a pocket. This drawing was part of the artist’s thinking for La Belle Jardinière (1507 or 1508, Paris, Louvre). Other related drawings show that Raphael would make a significant revision here by adapting Michelangelo’s idea for the Christ Child in his Bruges Madonna – although this is less a quotation and more a knowing refinement of the source.
Ben Thomas, art historian
Courtesy of the Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford
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