Numbered in pen and brown ink in the upper right margin, and on the verso, Annatus a Ligini, watermark encircled fluer-de-lis, drawn on Italian laid paper

340 x 230 mm. (13 3/8 x 9 in.)

Condition: The drawing is not laid down, minor foxing in the lower margin, remains of stitching in the left margin, chalk fresh and paper in a very good condition.

Minardi was born in Faenza and he went to Rome in 1803 where he studied at the Accademia di S. Luca, and in the studio of Camuccini, who with Benvenuti, represented Davids small following in Rome. Minardi was one of the most accurate draughtsman of his day. During the second decade of the century, when he was painting principally religious pictures, the influence of Caravaggesque chiaroscuro was gradually superseded by a light and crystalline type of painting, close in certain respects, to that of the Nazarenes. From 1818-21 he was Professor of the Accademia di S. Luca in Rome, where he had a decisive influence on the development of local official religious art.