HUBERT ROBERT (PARIS 1733-1808)

This sheet belongs to a dismantled album once owned by the marquis de Ganay, which contained studies after the antique, made by Robert between 1763 and 1764, at the end of his Roman years. Several sketchbooks of this type are known today, of which one, from the Moreau-Nélaton collection, remains intact (Musée du Louvre, inv. RF 11478-RF 11571). The sculpture is of the Athenian comic poet and playwright Menander (circa 342-292 B.C.) and can still be seen at the Museo Pio-Clementino at the Vatican, where Robert must have copied it.