1544
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Three Male Nudes is a 1544 by Domenico Beccafumi, a Renaissance work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see three naked men on a page—one lying on his stomach, two standing behind him. Beccafumi made this as a practice sheet for a special kind of print. Instead of one wood block, he’d use several, each inked in a different shade, to build up light and shadow. The lying man looks like a marble river god from ancient Rome, and the pose feels like something Michelangelo might have drawn. To see how this trick of layered blocks works, look up chiaroscuro.
Domenico Beccafumi was intensely aware of the work of his contemporary Michelangelo when he developed his own style for projects in Siena, south of Florence. This drawing is a study for a chiaroscuro print, a type of woodblock print using several blocks, some colored, to create light and shadow. The drawing features three male nudes whose roles are unknown. The closest figure, reclining with his back toward the viewer, recalls ancient sculptures of river gods as well as works by Michelangelo, including the reclining figures he sculpted for the Medici tombs in Florence.
Read the full account in the museum source.
Domenico di Pace Beccafumi (1486 – May 18, 1551) was an Italian Renaissance-Mannerist painter active predominantly in Siena. He is considered one of the last undiluted representatives of the Sienese school of painting.
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