Drawing after sculpture played a central role in the studio of Jacopo and Domenico Tintoretto and a large number of such drawings has survived. The casts copied were often after sculpture by Michelangelo and the largest group of such drawings, over sixty in total, shows Samson and the Philistines (for two examples, see C. Whistler et al., Drawing in Venice. Titian to Canaletto, exhib. cat., Oxford, Ashmolean, nos. 53 and 54, ill.). The present sheet must have been drawn in the Tintoretto studio and it, too, must be a copy after a cast. While drawn by a confident hand, it appears to have been made by an assistant rather than by Jacopo or Domenico themselves.

We are grateful to John Marciari for his assistance in cataloguing this drawing.