That Raphael competition
October 10 2012
Picture: Teylers Museum
I recently mentioned a novel approach to making attributions by the Teylers Museum in Holland. The museum's curators weren't sure about the attribution of the above drawing, and so decided to ask members of the public what they thought.
A reader has taken up the challenge. He identifies the lower head in this drawing, below, in the Louvre, and writes:
I don’t mean to be a killjoy, but the red chalk study of three heads (Teyler’s) can no way be Raphael. It’s a spiritless, meticulously drawn facsimile of a ‘lost’ drawing. I know the bottom study from a drawing in the Louvre (inv. 3862). The style of this bottom head study reminds me of Raphael’s long-standing competitor, Sebastian del Piombo, but the top two rule out such an attribution.
