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Italy: Rome, the Vatican. Record drawing for grotesque panels with Egg-and-dart border showing four classical medallions of varying sizes, in high relief, above a semi-circular painting of a classical ruin. All is surrounded by figures and animals. To one side is a sinuous border of figures and foliage.
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Reference number
Adam vol.26/12
Purpose
Italy: Rome, the Vatican. Record drawing for grotesque panels with Egg-and-dart border showing four classical medallions of varying sizes, in high relief, above a semi-circular painting of a classical ruin. All is surrounded by figures and animals. To one side is a sinuous border of figures and foliage.
Aspect
Elevation
Inscribed
Inscribed in ink in a contemporary hand 10
Signed and dated
- Undated, probably 1760 - 63
Medium and dimensions
Pencil, pen, watercolour
562 x 187, horizontal central foldline
Hand
Giuseppe Manocchi (attributed to)
Notes
This drawing is part of a set numbered in a contemporary hand from 1 to 10 (see Adam vol.26/3-12; also related is the drawing in Adam vol.26/14 and another group in Adam vol.26/186-200). All the drawings in this set of ten are for the top half of the pilaster decoration, and all share the same paper, original central foldline and draughtsmanship, attributed to Giuseppe Manocchi (c.1731-82). This drawing is for the top section of pilaster 1 on the Giovanni da Udine decoration of the logge. The Manocchi design differs considerably from the Ottaviani print (see below), which itself does not match the existing medallion subjects (see N. Dacros, Le Logge di Raffaello, Rome, 1986, p.262). There is a close version of this drawing, rather than the print in Sir John Soane's Museum, Soane volume SM 130/8, which shows the whole of the pilaster decoration. SM 130/11 also gives a version of this pilaster but with a different composition below the semi-circular landscape painting.
The decoration of the Vatican logge appeared as engravings between 1772 - 1777 in three parts: Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1772), Seconda Parte delle Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1776) and Terza ed Ultima Parte delle Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1777). Work on the project of recording was begun in 1760 and was more or less completed by 1768. The principal artists involved were the painter Gaetano Savorelli (d.1791) and the architect Pietro Camporesi (1726-81), and the engraver was Giovanni Ottaviani (1735-1808). The third volume was engraved by Giovanni Volpato (1733-1803), after drawings by Ludovico Tesio (1731-82).
The numerous drawings that Manocchi made of the Vatican decoration at this time would suggest that he was the draughtsman of this series (Adam vol.26/3-12), especially in view of James Adam's reference to 'My arabesque' of 1763. There is another incomplete set of 12 logge drawings in Sir John Soane's Museum Soane volume SM 130, also in Manocchi's hand, which may too have had an Adam provenance. According to Fuhring, there are Manocchi drawings for the Raphael logge in the Berlin Kunstbibliothek that may be c.1755 (see P. Fuhring, Design into Art, Drawings for Architecture and Ornament, 2 vols., London, 1989, I, pp.59-60). There are also several unfinished logge compositions in album four of the Hardwick drawings in the RIBA (see 4.12-14, 21). These have a lettered colour key and some have the note 'non, Fecci due pichole / none fatto', which indicates their provisional role. There were at least two sets of logge prints in the Adam sales, lot 58 in the first day of the 1818 sale and lot 124 in the first day of the 1821 sale (see A. Bolton, The Architecture of Robert and James Adam, 2 vols., London, 1922, II, pp.330, 335). Like Nicolas-Francoise-David Lhuiller (d.1793), Manocchi was connected with Charles-Louis Clérisseau and there are several Manocchi copies in the Hermitage, St Petersburg (see Charles-Louis Clérisseau (1721-1820) Dessins du musée de l'Ermitage Saint-Petersbourg, catalogue of an exhibition held at the Musée du Louvre, Paris, 1995, p.92).
The decoration of the Vatican logge appeared as engravings between 1772 - 1777 in three parts: Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1772), Seconda Parte delle Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1776) and Terza ed Ultima Parte delle Logge di Rafaele nel Vaticano (1777). Work on the project of recording was begun in 1760 and was more or less completed by 1768. The principal artists involved were the painter Gaetano Savorelli (d.1791) and the architect Pietro Camporesi (1726-81), and the engraver was Giovanni Ottaviani (1735-1808). The third volume was engraved by Giovanni Volpato (1733-1803), after drawings by Ludovico Tesio (1731-82).
The numerous drawings that Manocchi made of the Vatican decoration at this time would suggest that he was the draughtsman of this series (Adam vol.26/3-12), especially in view of James Adam's reference to 'My arabesque' of 1763. There is another incomplete set of 12 logge drawings in Sir John Soane's Museum Soane volume SM 130, also in Manocchi's hand, which may too have had an Adam provenance. According to Fuhring, there are Manocchi drawings for the Raphael logge in the Berlin Kunstbibliothek that may be c.1755 (see P. Fuhring, Design into Art, Drawings for Architecture and Ornament, 2 vols., London, 1989, I, pp.59-60). There are also several unfinished logge compositions in album four of the Hardwick drawings in the RIBA (see 4.12-14, 21). These have a lettered colour key and some have the note 'non, Fecci due pichole / none fatto', which indicates their provisional role. There were at least two sets of logge prints in the Adam sales, lot 58 in the first day of the 1818 sale and lot 124 in the first day of the 1821 sale (see A. Bolton, The Architecture of Robert and James Adam, 2 vols., London, 1922, II, pp.330, 335). Like Nicolas-Francoise-David Lhuiller (d.1793), Manocchi was connected with Charles-Louis Clérisseau and there are several Manocchi copies in the Hermitage, St Petersburg (see Charles-Louis Clérisseau (1721-1820) Dessins du musée de l'Ermitage Saint-Petersbourg, catalogue of an exhibition held at the Musée du Louvre, Paris, 1995, p.92).
Level
Drawing
Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation
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