Francisco de Zurbarán, Umkreis
Nach links gewandter Mann mit Buch, Frühes 17. Jahrhundert
This figure stretches out his hands holding a piece of drapery. The head, which is more faintly rendered than the clothes, turns to look up. Such positioning suggested to Alfonso Pérez Sánchez that this could be a study for Saint Simon Stock, who received the scapular (the brown overgarment worn by Carmelites as part of their habit) directly from the Virgin. He noted in the Corpus volume that: “In 1966, the Hamburg Exhibition Catalogue maintained, erroneously, that the saint holds a book in his hand. However, there seems to be no doubt that this is the cloth of a scapulary [sic].”[1] Once again, this drawing is to be understood as a drapery study of a model who has been asked to take up the pose of a saint, either Saint Simon Stock (as Pérez Sánchez suggests) or, say, Saint Didacus of Alcalá, the Franciscan who is usually shown gathering up his habit or friar's scapular before him to carry bread that miraculously turns into flowers. As stated above, the model appears to be the same as in at least two of the other drawings on blue paper (see inv. nos. 38640 and 38638, cat. nos.179 and 180).
Gabriele Finaldi
1. Angulo Iniguez and Pérez Sánchez 1985, 59.