34. Aurelio Lomi

Pisa 1556 – 1622 Pisa

Studies of a Girl Seated, and her Right Arm Holding an Apple, circa 1615-1616

This is a preparatory drawing for the seated woman in the Visitation, painted by Aurelio Lomi in about 1615-16 for the church of Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence. The general attitude of the figure and her costume can be rec­ognised even if certain elements are different, for example the direction of her gaze and the position of the arms. Drawn on the same sheet, the enlarged detail showing the raised right arm holding a fruit is closer to the final version. We catch Lomi here giving his full concentration to the task: as he drew, he repeated, altered and then pol­ished the model’s pose. He started with the figure of a seated woman, then altered the model’s right hand in or­der to introduce a narrative. In the foreground of the painting he has managed to present a little story: the woman takes the apple from the hands of a young boy, pointing to a second child who is weeping by her side.