Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, called Il Grechetto

Bears unidentified collector's mark, formerly thought to be that of Pierre Crozat (L.474);
Lord Overstone,
by inheritance to A.T. Lloyd;
sale, London, Sotheby's, 28 November 1945, lot 14;
Sir Anthony Blunt;
John Gaskin,
his sale and others, London, Christie's, 18 April 1989, lot 72,
where acquired by the late Jan Krugier 

London, Courtauld Institute Galleries, The Sir Anthony Blunt Collection, 1964, no. 14;
Philadelphia, Museum of Art, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, Master Draughtsman of the Italian Baroque, 1971, p. 66, no. 9, reproduced p. 67

A. Blunt, 'The Drawings of G.B. Castiglione,' Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 8, 1945, p. 9, no. 10;
Linie, Licht und Schatten, Meisterzeichnungen und Skulpturen der Sammlung Jan und Marie-Anne Krugier-Poniatowski, exhib. cat., Berlin 1999, p. 397, reproduced;
The Timeless Eye. Master Drawings from the Jan and Marie-Anne Krugier-Poniatowski Collection, exhib. cat., Berlin 1999, p. 398, reproduced

Laid down on the old mount with pen and ink framing lines, the first of which goes slightly over the edge of the drawing. Four corners cut . Few tiny light brown small stains towards the outer margins. A pinpoint hole near the center of the left margin. Overall in good condition. Sold mounted and framed in a modern wooden and gilded frame.
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When this drawing was exhibited in Philadelphia in 1971, Ann Percy pointed out the compositional similarities with the large painting by Castiglione of the same subject, datable to between 1640 and 1645, in Palazzo Durazzo Pallavicini, Genoa.¹  The drawing cannot be considered a direct preparatory study for the Durazzo composition, but A Sacrifice to Pan was a typical theme for Castiglione, which he must have treated in more than one version.  In this somewhat unfinished drawing stylistically comparable to Orpheus and Other Sketches in the Morgan Library, New York,² Castiglione is clearly still working towards a satisfactory compositional solution.  In this respect, the drawing differs from many of Castiglione’s surviving works on paper, which were conceived as finished works of art, some made to be sold and others to be kept in the studio as models for future paintings. 

Of the artist's surviving drawings, perhaps the most notable group is in the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle; these drawings entered the Royal Collection in 1762, when King George III acquired the Consul Smith collection.³

¹ Exhib. cat., Philadelphia, op. cit., p. 25, reproduced fig. 7
² Inv. no. It. 17.5, formerly in Janos Scholz collection
³ T.J. Standring and M. Clayton, Castiglione, Lost Genius, exhib. cat., London, The Queen's Gallery, 2013