Francisco Herrera, d. Ä. ("El Viejo"), Zeichner
Studie eines Apostels (?), nach oben blickend, 1630 - 1640
To a certain degree this sheet, with an apostle gazing toward the upper left and pointing downward with his right hand and with an open left hand, matches a painting of Saint Matthew.[1] The painting adopts the apostle's overall pose; both the painting and the drawing depict the same open left hand in the bottom right. Antonio Martínez Ripoll (1978) pointed out other similarities, including the saint's face, which resembles that of the Head of Saint Paul with His Throat Cut at the Museo Nacional del Prado (P 3058).
The Córdoba painting's rather free reliance on the drawing suggests that this series served as a repertoire of sacred figures that Francisco de Herrera the Elder resorted to on occasion but did not reproduce precisely. The fact that the series is designed to explore all possible positions of the head and arms while varying the direction of the subjects' gazes supports this assumption.
Jens Hoffmann-Samland
1. Saint Matthew, 44 78 x 35 in. (114 x 89 cm), Córdoba, Museo de Bellas Artes, inv. no. CE2337P. The similarity is visible despite the poor condition of the painting.