Baccio del Bianco

Sale, Paris, Christie's, 22 March 2007, lot 18,
where purchased by the present owner

According to the biographer Filippo Baldinucci, Baccio del Bianco was especially celebrated for his amusing subjects and caricatures, of which he produced a fair number.  The purpose of these drawings is not known but they fully display the artist's observant nature and his acute sense of humour.  The present sheet illustrates an elegant couple and their dog, fancifully dressed, with a dwarf on their right.  

Baccio del Bianco started his artistic training with Giovanni Biliverti (1585-1644) and frequented the academy of Giulio Parigi (1571-1635) where he met and befriended Stefano della Bella (1610-1664).  On his return from his travels to Vienna, as a military engineer, and Prague, he established a school of perspective and architecture and became involved with the ephemeral decorations and stage productions of the Medici.  He frescoed the delightful and humorous genre scenes in Casa Buonarroti.¹

1. G. Cantelli, Repertorio della Pittura Fiorentina del Seicento, Florence 1983, figs. 278-280