D r. John O’Brien has been discretely but enthusiastically assembling this remarkable collection of 16th to 18th Century Italian drawings for the last 55 years. The collection is led by an extremely fine double sided sheet by Taddeo Zuccaro, created in preparation for his decoration of the Frangipani Chapel in Rome, a project the artist began in late 1558 / early 1559. Other highlights of the collection include a freely drawn depiction of Felicity and Fortune by Annibale Carracci as well as an outstanding compositional study by Corrado Giaquinto for the Duomo in Naples. Alongside the Giaquinto are no fewer than 16 drawings by Giambattista Tiepolo and his son Giandomenico, with one particular rarity being Giambattista’s lively and elaborate compositional drawing for his etching of The Discovery of the Tomb of Punchinello. Beyond the Italian core of the collection are a small number of French and Spanish drawings, with the most notable of these a complex and powerful drawing of The Lamentation, by Jusepe de Ribera.
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