Head of a Woman

Strozzi was the leading painter in Genoa during the second decade of the century, later one of three “foreigners” responsible for reinvigorating painting in Venice, and generally one of the great pure painters of the Italian Baroque. His works combine the rarefied formulae of later Tuscan Mannerism with the chia-roscuro of the Caravaggisti, the anecdotal naturalism of the Netherlandish, and a uniquely rich, fluid handling of paint. His early drawings, relatively numerous, similarly combine a calligraphic stroke with a more realistic description of surface and Strozzi’s unusual types of oval faces, saucer eyes and pinched mouths. Late drawings such as this, very rare, are characterized by a broad touch and general atmosphere. While this drawing does bear some relation to several paintings of the Venetian period, it is not strictly preparatory.