GIORGIO VASARI (Arezzo 1511-1574 Florence) Saints Luke

GIORGIO VASARI
(Arezzo 1511-1574 Florence)
Saints Luke, Blaise and Dominic.
Pen and brown ink and gray wash over black chalk. 350x280mm; 13¾x11 inches. Inscribed "Sunta depti repromissionem" in ink in the scroll held by the putto upper center recto, and "Giorgio Vasari 9" by a later hand in ink, lower left recto.Provenance: William Fagg, London; sold Christie's, London, April 20, 1993, lot 12; with Yvonne Tan Bunzl, London, 1994; sold Christie's, Paris, November 27, 2002, lot 23; private collection, Massachusetts.Published: Härb, The Drawings of Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574), Rome, 2015, number 108.According to Härb, this drawing was presumably a design for an altarpiece, though it has not been linked to any known works of the kind by Vasari. He notes that, "The relatively heavy figures resemble those in Vasari's organ shutters for S. Gennaro, Naples, of 1545-46. The figure of St. Luke and the putto holding a scroll above (the latter appears, with minor changes, also in the organ shutters) are close to the prophet and putto at the left of [another drawing with St. Luke by Vasari], likewise datable to around 1545," (see Härb, number 107).