Francesco Galli Bibiena

Laid down onto another sheet of paper for support. The paper has a number of creases and cracks and in some places there are tears which appear to have been repaired and others where you can see the support below. The cracks and tears are mainly concentrated around the outer margins. There are two more obvious horizontal creases/cracks running through the centre of the sheet. However the support below appears to have stablised the drawing and the medium remains fresh and the overall image is still strong. Sold in an elaborate, gilded arched top frame.
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This elaborate and grandiose drawing is probably a design for an altarpiece.  Francesco Bibiena was part of the successful Galli-Bibiena family business, son of Giovan Maria and brother to Ferdinando.  Although the members of the family dynasty were perhaps most renowned for their work in theatre and opera scenography, their work extended far beyond the theatre and their projects in architecture and church design were also prolific.  Francesco spent the majority of his life traveling and working on numerous projects, inluding the prestigious rebuilding of the Hoftheater in Vienna under the patronage of Emperor Leopold I.  He also held the position of professor at the Accademia Clementina and worked on a manuscript entitled L'Architettura maestra delle arte che la compongono.

The present drawing combines Francesco's skills in both architecture and drawing.  We know that he worked on a number of altars for various unidentified churches and it appears that this drawing may be a design for one of those commissions.  The Raising of Lazarus can be compared to another design for an altarpiece by Francesco, Composition for an Altarpiece Alluding to Death now in the National Museum, Lisbon.¹  The approach in both designs, with the architectural framework surrounding the subject of the altarpiece, is very similar. 

1. M.A. Beaumont, Eighteenth-Century Scenic and Architectural Design: Drawings by The Galli Bibiena Family, From Collections in Portugal, exhib. cat., Art Services International, 1990-91, p. 91, no. 51, reproduced p. 69