Study for the ‘Allegory of Poetry’ or ‘Music’

This drawing represents an early idea for an especially beautiful late painting, possibly commissioned by the Duke of Mantua, Castiglione’s principal patron from the 1650s onward, presently in a Genoese private collection. Already identifiable are the personification of Poetry at the center, the bacchante to her left, and the satyr to her right. In the finished work, the three figures are more compact in their grouping, and the composition is filled with accouterments at the left. While the subject and format pertain to the Baroque classicism of artists like Poussin and Testa, the drawing’s restless forms and calligraphic line are indelibly Genoese.