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Your galleryA Sheet of Anatomical Studies
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Follow the cords of muscle along each forearm into the clenched fists, then find the upturned face beneath them.
Besides ancient sculpture, Rubens learned about the ideal human body from early anatomy books, which showed the muscles with the skin removed. He drew these two locked forearms and a face in that manner, in pen and ink, which cannot easily be blended or erased. The sheet is one of about a dozen he meant to publish as a book on anatomy; it never appeared, but years after his death a member of his workshop issued engravings that included these images.
Pen and brown ink on ivory laid paper · 27.1 × 18.8 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Baroque
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Details and source
- Museum title
- A Sheet of Anatomical Studies
- Artist
- Peter Paul Rubens Flemish, 1577-1640
- Date
- 1600/10
- Medium
- Pen and brown ink on ivory laid paper
- Dimensions
- 27.1 × 18.8 cm (10 11/16 × 7 7/16 in.)
- Credit line
- Regenstein Acquisition Fund
- 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.