An Angel in Flight

Prints and Drawings

c. 1599-1600

Giuseppe Cesari, called Il Cavaliere d’Arpino
Italian, 1568–1640

This drawing is a study for an angel in a fresco executed in the church of San Giovanni in Laterano, in Rome. Painstakingly modeled with fine lines of black chalk, the dynamic, muscular figure of the angel recalls Michelangelo’s monumental nudes created earlier in the century, while the androgynous features of his face are typical of the elegant style favored in the late 1500s. Considered a child prodigy by his contemporaries, Giuseppe Cesari became the head of the artists’ academy in Rome at the young age of 31. His busy workshop was a training ground for numerous pupils, the most notable of which was perhaps Caravaggio.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Prints and Drawings

Artist: Giuseppe Cesari
Title: An Angel in Flight
Place: Italy (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1588–1640
Medium: Black chalk with red chalk on cream laid paper
Inscriptions: Inscribed lower right: “Joseppo d’Arpinas”; lower left “1610 "
Dimensions: 39.7 × 35.5 cm (15 11/16 × 14 in.)
Credit Line: The Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Endowment Fund
Reference Number: 2021.414
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/262227/manifest.json

R. Weigel, Die Werke der Maler in ihren Handzeichnungen. Beschreibendes Verzeichniss der in Kupfer gestochenen, lithographirten und photographirten Facsimiles von Originalzeichnungen grosser Meister (Leipzig, 1865), no. 98 (ill.).
J. G. van Gelder, ‘Lambert ten Kate als Kunstverzamelaar’, Nederlands kunsthistorisch jaarboek, XXI (1970), p. 173 (ill.).
J. G. van Gelder and I. Jost, Jan de Bisschop and his Icones & Paradigmata. Classical Antiquities and Italian Drawings for Artistic Instruction in Seventeenth Century Holland (Doornspijk, 1985), pp. 234–35.
Barbara Gaehtgens, Adriaen van der Werff, 1659-1722 (Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1987), p. 333.
M. S. Bolzoni (Rome, 2013), no. 189 (ill.).
H. Röttgen, Cavalier Giuseppe Cesari d’Arpino. Die Zeichnungen/ I disegni (Stuttgart, 2013), II:no. 385 (ill.).

Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, From Raphael to Carracci: The Art of Papal Rome, 2009, cat. 148 (ill.).
New York, The Morgan Library and Museum, Mannerism and Modernism: The Kasper Collection of Drawings and Photographs, 2011, cat. 30 (ill.).

Possibly Jan Six (1618–1700), Amsterdam; sold, possibly Amsterdam, April 6, 1702, part of lot 3. Lambert Hermansz ten Kate (1674–1731), Amsterdam; sold, Amsterdam, June 16, 1732, album A, no. 8, for 30 guilders to Antoni Rutgers (1695–1778), Amsterdam; sold, Amsterdam, December 1, 1778, album I, no. 521, for 8 guilders to Cornelis Ploos van Amstel (1726–1798), Amsterdam; sold, Amsterdam, March 3, 1800, album AA, no. 39. Baron Roger Portalis (1841–1912), Paris [Lugt 2232]. Léon Voillemot (1881–1949), Paris [Lugt 789d]. Galerie Pierre Gaubert, Paris, to a private collection, Brussels. With W.M. Brady & Co., New York, by 2006 [Master Drawings 1520-1890, 2006, cat. 8]; sold to Herbert Kasper (1926–2020), New York, 2006; sold by Christies, New York, Oct. 14, 2021, lot 23, to the Art Institute of Chicago.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.