Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (Venice 1696-1770 Madrid)

Similar to a group of drawings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, where an older man is paired with a younger woman; in the case of the New York drawings, the male figure is given the distinctive attributes of Time (invs. 37.165.19, 23 and 42; J. Bean and W. Griswold, 18th Century Italian Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1990, pp. 216-9, nos. 207-9). Another drawing from the same series was with Luca Baroni in 2010 (cat. 2010, no. 16). The female figure in the present drawing, with a garland in her hair, seems more likely to be an allegory of Beauty rather than Truth, making her juxtaposition with the elderly figure of Time even more evocative.