ATTRIBUTED TO FRANCESCO PRIMATICCIO (Bologna 1503-1570 Paris)

This is an unpublished drawing belonging to a group of sheets of the same size and similar or identical technique, depicting standing draped women inspired by antique sculpture; all others are at the Louvre (for example, inv. 8655, 8688, 8641, 8667b; see D. Cordellier in Primatice. Maître de Fontainebleau, exhib. cat., Paris, Musée du Louvre, 2004-2005, pp. 458-459, nos. 268-270, ill.). Particularly close in style are a subgroup of six sheets: the two last mentioned above, as well as inv. 8646, 8647, 8648 bis, and 8672a. Although they cannot be connected directly to any recorded project by Primaticcio, Dominique Cordellier noted they reflect the artist’s late style, and may be by the artist himself, from the time he was working on the decoration of the Valois chapel at Saint-Denis, for which he planned ‘very many statues in marble and bronze, and sundry histories in low relief’ (ibid., p. 478, under no. 268).