Figure Studies

Vicente Carducho and his older brother, Bartolomé, left their native Florence and moved to Spain in 1585 to work at the Escorial, Philip II's unique complex north of Madrid comprising a palace, monastery, seminary, basilica, and royal tomb. Trained in the Florentine academic tradition, Carducho was a prolific painter and draughtsman. In 1633 he published an academic treatise, " Diálogos de la pintura ", an erudite defence of painting as a liberal art (the work of learned humanists, not artisans). The men depicted here are most likely studies of secondary figures for a larger composition that has not been identified.