Confronted profiles of an old man and a youth
Red chalk study contrasting age and youth
In red chalk two heads face one another in strict profile: at left a bald, aged man with a deep-set eye, jutting brow, hooked nose and prominent, toothless chin; at right a youth with full lips and a great mass of tightly curling hair. The pairing sets the angular, furrowed features of age against the smooth roundness of youth, with cloaked shoulders lightly indicated below each head. The crowned Uffizi collector's stamp is impressed at lower right. No text is present.
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Profile of the aged man
The bald old man is drawn in sharp left-facing profile, his features exaggerated into a nutcracker of jutting brow, hooked nose and up-thrust chin. Deep folds mark the cheek and neck, and his shoulders are wrapped in a cloak lightly worked in chalk.
Profile of the curly-haired youth
Opposite him a young man faces left, his smooth features and full lips framed by an abundant mass of tightly wound curls. The contrast of his rounded, unlined face with the old man's angular head is the point of the study.