Study for a Standing Young Man, Raising a Curtain and Looking at Left

This large-scale life study was drawn from a male assistant (‘garzone’) posing in the artist's workshop, in order to design the female attendant figure holding the curtain on the right in Bandinelli's marble relief of the ‘Birth of the Virgin’ (Shrine of Santa Casa, Loreto), from 1518-1519. The sheet is typical of Bandinelli's early drawings in red chalk, which he worked up with a variety of mark, from sharp outlines to broad areas of soft modelling, in a manner that is reminiscent of the draughtsmanship of Andrea del Sarto (Italian, 1486-1530). Another life study in red chalk for the same figure, and based on the same workshop assistant, is in the British Museum, London (inv. 1885,0593.5). The British Museum study portrays the figure in less detail and with his head turned in a three-quarter view, rather than in profile, as he is seen in the Metropolitan Museum sheet.

The male workshop assistant seen in these drawings was then transformed into female figures in two pen and ink drawings, in Veste, Coburg and the Uffizi, Florence respectively. The pose was finally resolved with only small adjustments in the final marble relief. The use of male models for both female and male figures was normal practice during the Renaissance.
(Carmen C. Bambach, 2000)