The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 21, 2025

Architectural Studies (verso) [partially visible on recto]

c. 1580

Paolo Veronese

(Italian, 1528–1588)
Italy, Venice
pen and brown ink
Sheet: 20.5 x 23.4 cm (8 1/16 x 9 3/16 in.); Secondary Support: 22 x 28.2 cm (8 11/16 x 11 1/8 in.)
Gift of Robert Hays Gries 1939.670.b
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

The sheet of paper was a more vibrant, pure blue when the drawing was made; aging has rendered the color of the sheet closer to a green-gray.

Description

In the last decades of his career, Paolo Veronese and his workshop produced a number of idyllic visions of the Holy Family in repose in the countryside during their flight into Egypt. This crowded sheet of loose, lively sketches was recently proposed to have inaugurated an intensive period of interest in this subject that began around 1570. The sheet shows two horizontal rows with eight versions of the seated Virgin holding the Christ Child, in some of the sketches accompanied by the infant John the Baptist or Joseph, and in one by a donkey. The sheet presents an unusual case of being preparatory not for paintings, but for finished chiaroscuro drawings, now in London, Berlin, and Cambridge, MA. While the individual sketches may appear at first glance a mass of tangled lines and confused forms, such pen and ink drawings demonstrate the Venetian artist's restless creative energy.
  • Dr. Daniel Huebsch, Cleveland; Robert Hays Gries, Cleveland.
  • Clayton, Stephen W. Veronese & His Studio In North American Collections. [Birmingham, Ala.]: [Birmingham Museum of Art], 1972. Reproduced: p. 7, 44
    Johnson, Mark M. Idea to Image: Preparatory Studies from the Renaissance to Impressionism. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1980. Mentioned: cat no. 19, pp. 27-28
    Olszewski, Edward J., and Jane Glaubinger. The Draftsman's Eye: Late Italian Renaissance Schools and Styles. Cleveland: Published by the Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with the Indiana University Press, 1981. Mentioned: cat. no. 109, p. 18, 75, 109, 119, 134-135
    Rearick, William R., Veronese, and Terisio Pignatti. The Art of Paolo Veronese, 1528-1588. Washington: National Gallery of Art, 1988. Mentioned: cat. no. 46, pp. 94-95
  • Concept, Dogma and Feeling: Italian Drawings 1550-1650. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 20, 1991).
    Veronese: Painter and Craftsman. National Gallery of Art (organizer) (November 13, 1988-February 20, 1989).
    Italian Drawings from the Permanent Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 16, 1986-March 1, 1987).
    National Schools of Style. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 14-September 18, 1983).
    Connoisseurship in Italian Figural Compositions. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 21, 1980-February 15, 1981).
    Idea to Image: Preparatory Studies from the Renaissance to Impressionism. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (February 19-March 23, 1980).
    The Draftsman's Eye: Late Italian Renaissance Schools and Styles. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 6-April 22, 1979).
    Veronese and His Studio in North American Collections. Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL (organizer) (October 1-November 15, 1972); Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, AL (December 2-31, 1972).
    Italian Prints and Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 30-March 26, 1968).
    Old Master Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 10-31, 1964).
    Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 11-September 10, 1963).
    Drawings from the Museum Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 17-August 24, 1942).
    Drawings by Old Italian Masters. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 5, 1940-February 25, 1941).
  • {{cite web|title=Architectural Studies (verso) [partially visible on recto]|url=false|author=Paolo Veronese|year=c. 1580|access-date=21 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1939.670.b