Allegory of Painting: a Woman at Her Easel with Putti
The personification of Painting, brush in hand, attended by children who read and write
A finished pen-and-brown-wash drawing showing the personification of Painting as a seated, half-draped woman who turns to look up while painting on a panel set upon an easel at the left. To her right, in an architectural setting framed by a column and heavy architrave, three children or putti attend her: one leans over a desk to write, another sits reading an open book. An inscription runs across the top of the sheet and a signature with a date appears on the architrave; this further text is present on the leaf but is not transcribed here. A Florentine collection stamp is impressed at the lower right.
On this page
Personification of Painting at the easel
At the left a seated woman, her breast bared and drapery falling from her lap, holds a brush to a panel raised on a tall wooden easel and turns her head upward as if to an ideal source. The figure embodies the art of Painting itself, presented as an allegory of the practice of the painter.
Putti reading and writing
On the right three children are grouped in an architectural setting; one bends over a desk to write, another sits on a low block reading an open book, and a third leans in behind. Their studious poses balance the central allegorical woman.