Study of a Standing Woman

Angelica Kauffmann

1792–96 · Black chalk, heightened with white chalk, on paper prepared with gray-blue gouache · Drawings and Prints

This sheet is a preliminary study for one of the mothers in Kauffman’s painting Let the Little Children Come unto Me from around 1796. The painting depicts a scene from Matthew 19:14 in which Christ blesses the children that are brought to see him. In this drawing, Kauffman meticulously renders the mother’s dress. Taking the paper as a base color, she shades in reverse, using energetic strokes of white chalk to bring out the luminous quality of the fabric. In the painting, the mother carries an infant in her left arm and holds the hand of another in her right, both represented on this sheet as faint outlines.

Artist

Angelica Kauffmann

Date

1792–96

Medium

Black chalk, heightened with white chalk, on paper prepared with gray-blue gouache

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

Purchase, Brooke Russell Astor Bequest, 2013