Seated Nude with Crossed Legs

The artwork

A nude boy seated with crossed legs, drawn in black chalk, is one of the models Pontormo studied for the Medici villa at Poggio a Caiano. It comes printed on handmade Amalfi paper, in a handmade frame.

• A black chalk drawing, a natural black drawing stone, on the warm tone of the paper.
• A figure drawing that looks good in a study, a bedroom or a hallway.
• A gift for those who draw, for those who practise yoga, for lovers of Pontormo.

Between 1519 and 1520 Pontormo frescoed a lunette for the Medici in the great hall of the villa at Poggio a Caiano, near Prato. This sheet is one of the studies for the figures on that wall.

Visitors to the exhibition have compared it to Michelangelo's ignudi on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, the seated nude youths that frame the stories of Genesis. Michelangelo had painted them in Rome only a few years earlier, and Pontormo's boy seems to answer from Florence.

The drawing is held at the Uffizi, in the Prints and Drawings Department, under number 6685 F, and is among the sheets lent to the exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale in Rome.

Above a desk or in a bedroom, it brings into the home the daily work of a great painter. It is the gift for those who draw and for lovers of the human body in art.

Unique quality material

Print on handmade Amalfi paper
Sheet size: 29 x 42 cm (11.4 x 16.5 in)
Framed size: 31 x 44 cm (12.2 x 17.3 in)
Material: artwork printed on very fine handmade Amalfi paper with deckled edges
Frame: dark brown with a gold fillet, handmade, with glass