Portrait Bust of a Young Man

The Portrait Bust of a Young Man is a study created in 1830, executed "After Alessandro Filipepi, called Sandro Botticelli Italian, 1444/45-1510." This classification as a drawing indicates a nineteenth-century artist’s academic engagement with the Florentine Renaissance master, focusing specifically on the profile and modeling of a male subject. Although produced centuries after the original, the work exemplifies the enduring reverence for Botticelli’s classical forms and precise draughtsmanship during the Neoclassical period.

The composition utilizes brush and brown ink and brown and gray wash, skillfully laid over preliminary traces of graphite. This complex combination of mediums allowed the copyist to define the planes of the face and neck, rendering the bust with a sculptural clarity reminiscent of the Italian Quattrocento originals. The wash technique provides subtle tonal variations, emphasizing the contour and the texture of the drapery around the shoulders. The drawing itself is rendered on ivory wove paper, which has been meticulously tipped onto a larger sheet of tan laid paper with gray fibers, a common mounting practice for finished studies.

This drawing is historically significant as it documents the continued study and circulation of Renaissance imagery throughout 19th-century Italy. It reflects a period when access to such masterworks, whether through direct study or copies, was essential for artistic training. The work currently resides in the permanent collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. Due to its historical nature, high-quality prints and archival access may be found through public domain collections, preserving the record of this study after Botticelli.