Workshop of Hans Baldung, called Grien

From an album of drawings, believed to have been assembled by Captain William Henry Shippard, RN (1803-1865),
thereafter by descent to the present owners

Laid down on a backing sheet, and then on a 19th-century album sheet. The paper somewhat discoloured, with a few light stains, especially towards lower left. A few small dark spots, and two whiteish spots in figure's face. Two small puncture holes, one in lower nose, one in beard. Chalk somewhat rubbed on right side of beard, and lower left, but elsewhere in reasonably good, fresh condition.
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This previously unknown drawing, which has emerged from an album that is believed to have been assembled in the mid-19th century by an English naval captain, is a significant addition to the known corpus of drawings produced by Hans Baldung, known as 'Grien' (1484/85-1545), and his immediate associates.  Baldung spent part of his early career, circa 1503-1507, in the workshop of Albrecht Dürer (whose name was inscribed, apparently by Captain Shippard, on the album sheet to which the present drawing is pasted), but he soon went his own way, professionally and stylistically, becoming one of the leading painters and draughtsmen working in early 16th-century Germany. 

The type of figure seen here is very familiar from Baldung's paintings, and stylistically the combination of clearly outlined forms in certain areas, combined with much looser line-work in others (such as the back of the man's head), all developed in three dimensions through extremely subtle stumped shading, is also close to the known drawings of this type by Baldung himself.  A particularly fine example of such a head study by Baldung is the red chalk Study of the heads of two men, in the British Museum¹, and other comparable sheets in black chalk are in the Albertina, Vienna, and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris (the former dated 1516).²

The British Museum drawing is generally associated with Baldung's great masterpiece, the high altar of the cathedral at Freiburg-im-Breisgau.  A complex, multi-panel work of which the central scene depicts The Coronation of the Virgin, this is the only major altarpiece by Baldung that still remains in its original location.³  It is dated 1516, but by early 1512 the artist had already moved to Freiburg, where he established a workshop and employed various assistants to help him bring this monumental commission to fruition. 

A small but relatively coherent group of some ten studies of heads, drawn in a manner closely related to that of Baldung yet clearly not by him, can convincingly be linked with this phase of his career - and indeed with this project, as several of them, though not precise studies for the painting, can be loosely associated with figures in the finished work.  Six of these drawings, all in black chalk, are in the Kunstmuseum, Basel.⁴  All, like the present work, are drawn very much in Baldung's manner, but the handling is more formulaic, linear and repetitive.  They must have been made by an as yet unidentified studio assistant, working with Baldung in Freiburg during these vital years.  The present drawing is in many respects comparable to those in Basel, although the handling is a little more varied, personal and dynamic.  The highly stylised depiction of the beard, looking almost like a rough sea in a Japanese woodcut, is particularly distinctive, as is the walnut-like ear.  The figure's gaze is also very clear and focussed, and in some respects this drawing approaches a little closer to the level of the master than do most of the others in this group.  All the same, it seems extremely probable that this drawing too was executed some time between 1512 and 1516 by one of the assistants working in Baldung's Freiburg workshop, and indeed there is more than a passing resemblance between the figure depicted and the balding, bearded figure of St. Paul, seen on the inner left wing of the altar (fig. 1).⁵  The paper, with its bunch of grapes watermark, is also consistent with such an origin, but is not exactly the same paper as that on which the six drawings in Basel are executed.⁶

Even if the name of the artist responsible for this powerful drawing remains unknown, this is a discovery of some significance, as few if any drawings of any importance have been added in modern times to the known body of studies produced in the hugely influential workshop of Hans Baldung. 

We are grateful to Dr. Christian Müller, of the Kustmuseum Basel, for his kind assistance in the preparation of this catalogue entry.  

1.  Inv. 1949-4-11-106
2.  C. Koch, Die Zeichnungen Hans Baldung Griens, Berlin 1941, cat. nos. 48, 49

3.  G. von der Osten, Hans Baldung Grien, Gemälde und Dokumente, Berlin 1983, pp. 99-118, cat. 26, pls. 64-87

4.  Tilman Falk, Hans Baldung Grien im Kunstmuseum Basel, exhib. cat., Basel Kunstmuseum, 1978, pp. 62-65, cat. 35-40, figs. 37, 41, 44-47.

5.  Von der Osten, op. cit., pl. 78

6.  Those sheets are all watermarked with either a small crown or a bull's head.