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Look from the angel’s raised hand at the top down to Abraham’s bowed back and the bare soles of his feet.
In Genesis, three men appear to Abraham, and he bows to the ground before them, knowing them to be angels. Tiepolo sets the angels on a bank of cloud, one of them raising an arm, while Abraham kneels below with his back to us and his staff at his side. Over a sketch in black chalk he worked with the pen and with brown and gray washes, about 1726.
Pen and brown ink and brush and brown and gray wash, over black chalk, on ivory laid paper · 43.1 × 28.5 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Rococo
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Details and source
- Museum title
- Three Angels Appearing to Abraham
- Artist
- Giovanni Battista Tiepolo Italian, 1696–1770
- Date
- c. 1726
- Medium
- Pen and brown ink and brush and brown and gray wash, over black chalk, on ivory laid paper
- Dimensions
- 43.1 × 28.5 cm (17 × 11 1/4 in.)
- Credit line
- Margaret Day Blake Collection
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.