George Richmond RA, British 1809-1896- Study of the Prophet Daniel, after Michelangelo Buonarroti, c.1838; pencil, coloured chalks and watercolour on grey paper, signed with initials 'GR' (on the reverse), 63.5 x 49.2 cm. Provenance: Private...

George Richmond RA,

British 1809-1896-

Study of the Prophet Daniel, after Michelangelo Buonarroti, c.1838;

pencil, coloured chalks and watercolour on grey paper, signed with initials 'GR' (on the reverse), 63.5 x 49.2 cm.

Provenance: Private Collection, UK.

Note: The original fresco of the ‘Prophet Daniel’ by Michelangelo is a squinch on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, Rome, completed between c.1508–12. Famously, Michelangelo was on top of a platform of the scaffolding while painting the ‘Prophet Daniel’, when a violent earthquake shook Rome and the platform collapsed, sending him tumbling to the ground. Michelangelo remained a strong influence on Richmond and it is most likely that the present work was painted at the Sistine Chapel in January 1838.

Richmond and his wife arrived in Rome in November 1837. He launched into his work, studying in the Vatican, Sistine Chapel and elsewhere during the day, and drawing from life or painting at home in the evening. Of working at the Sistine Chapel, he wrote, ‘We get on the cornice by paying a scudo, but it was so fearfully narrow that one can hardly abstract oneself sufficiently from the dangerous look of the situation and contemplate the works… The more I see of those who copy M[ichel] A[ngelo] the more steadily convinced I feel that he of all men in art will least adorn an imitation – one can bear to be reminded through an imitation of Leonardo, Rafaello and the other great painters but M.A thoughts can only be well read in his own language and it is the perfect harmony between the thoughts and the expression of it that enables to first bear and then to admire the labours of the mighty man.’

In January 1838, Richmond went to Fillipo Agricola, the managing artist of the Sistine Chapel, to arrange the erection of scaffolding so as to be able to study the ceiling more closely and make copies of the frescoes. Once organised, he commented, ‘The simplicity of the parts – and the breadth of execution are most astonishing – they look very much like large drawings in body colour and the parts that remain uninjured shew that the colouring must have been of a very high character. The masses of light and the shadow are truly great and in this how much finer are the works of M[ichel]. A[ngelo] than Rafaello – the drapes all through the series of Prophets and Sybils is great and at the same time that it displays the form which it envelops - is as unlike a skin or allegorical arrangement as possible but is truly drapery of the highest order – The folds are few, large and long – and I think generally running parallel to the limbs.’ (R. Lister ‘George Richmond, A Critical Biography’, 1981, pp 30–38).

Richmond left Rome in June 1839, returning there for a further period of study in October 1840, and was back in England by February 1841