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Master Drawings

Master Drawings is the leading international periodical for the study of drawings from the fourteent Master Drawings Association, Inc.

is a not-for-profit organization incorporated in the State of New York on March 16, 1962, for the purpose of disseminating knowledge in the field of Western draftsmanship since the Renaissance. Its mission is fulfilled mainly through the publication of the subscription-based, academic quarterly Master Drawings, which was launched in 1963. The founding Editor was the late Felice Stampfle, Curator o

f Drawings and Prints at the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the first Associate Editors were the late Jacob Bean, Curator of Drawings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Egbert Haverkamp-Begemann, who is Professor Emeritus at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Master Drawings aspires to be the leading international periodical for the study of drawings from the fourteenth century to the present day in Europe and the Americas. Edited to the highest academic standards, it seeks to present the best and most important new research in a clear, elegant, and accessible format. The journal is primarily concerned with the publication of newly discovered material, significant reattributions, and fresh interpretations. Each issue, extensively illustrated with high-quality color and black-and-white images, consists of approximately 144 pages of articles, notes, exhibition and book reviews, as well as trade advertising. Other features, such as interviews with living artists and essays about historical collectors or collections, are intended to foster a sense of continuity between the pre-modern and modern eras. The journal’s target readership is a diverse and interrelated constituency of international curators, academics, students, collectors, and dealers. The language of the quarterly is English, but submissions are encouraged from a broad range of specialists throughout the world, mainly Europe and the Americas. may hold events that advance its mission and promote contact and collaboration within all sectors of the international drawings community. In light of changing research patterns in a digital age, the Board of Directors is committed to maintaining an online presence for the journal in order to increase its accessibility by making past content available through internet archiving programs.

09/25/2025

“Deconstructing Nature: Environmental Transformation in the Lucas Collection,” at the Baltimore Museum of Art, explores how artists working in 19th-century Europe and French-occupied northern Africa reflected and participated in society’s changing views and relationships to the environment. Featuring more than 50 works on paper drawn from the BMA’s George A. Lucas Collection, the exhibition, on view until January 4, 2026, is organized thematically. It focuses on five specific environments and the ways artists explored them in their work: The Desert, The Forest, The Field, The City, and The Studio.

Among the artists represented are Jean-François Millet, Eugène Delacroix, James McNeill Whistler, and Mary Cassatt. The exhibit is part of the BMA’s “Turn Again to the Earth” environmental initiative in celebration of the museum’s 110th anniversary.

(Image: Jean-François Millet, “The Gleaners,” black conté crayon with traces of red chalk on paper, Baltimore Museum of Art)

09/21/2025

Join Dr. Colin B. Bailey, Katharine J. Rayner Director of our institutional partner, the Morgan Library & Museum, for a stimulating lecture titled “Renoir’s Creative Process.” The talk is in connection with the Morgan’s exhibition, “Renoir Drawings,” and takes place Friday, October 17, from 6–7 PM in Gilder Lehrman Hall on the Ground Floor.

“Renoir Drawings,” the first exhibition at the Morgan to be curated by Dr. Bailey, coincides with his tenth anniversary as its director. While Renoir’s paintings remain instantly recognizable, his drawings, watercolors, and pastels are less widely known. In fact, drawing was central to his artistic practice over the course of a long and varied career. In this lecture, Dr. Bailey will explore the ways in which the artist used paper to test ideas, plan compositions, and interpret landscapes and the human figure.

While registration is encouraged, seating is on a first come, first served basis. The exhibition will be open to visitors before and after the lecture. For more information go to:
https://www.themorgan.org/programs/lecture-colin-b-bailey-renoirs-creative-process

(Image: Auguste Renoir, “Boating Couple,” pastel on paper, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

09/19/2025

“Focus on the Peck Collection: Dutch Castles,” at the Ackland Museum of Art, Chapel Hill, NC, features “castle portraits” shown both intact and in picturesque ruin. This installment of works from the Peck Collection includes Abraham de Haen’s 1733 drawing of Beverweerd Castle, a seventeenth-century print of Berkenrode Castle, and three views of Spangen Castle. From medieval strongholds to elegant estates, Dutch castles and their ruins could symbolize status, regional identity, and national pride. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, artists responded to growing interest in history and topography by depicting these structures with increasing accuracy. The works, on view until November 11, reveal the artists’ skill in capturing architectural detail, shifting light, and the passage of time while offering documentation of the nation’s past for historians and contemporary viewers alike.
(Image: Abraham de Haen, “A View of Castle Beverweerd,” pen and gray ink, gray wash, over graphite on paper, The Peck Collection, Ackland Museum of Art, NC)

09/16/2025

Femke Speelberg’s fascinating analysis of a rare and monumental design for a sacrament house attributed to the Late-Gothic German architect Lorenz Lechler opens this quarter’s issue of MASTER DRAWINGS (Vol. 63, no. 3). Speelberg, Curator of Historic Ornament, Design, and Architecture at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, “confronts the drawing with Lechler’s known biography as well as the surviving corpus of Gothic architecture drawings in an effort to better understand its significance and possible function.” In focusing on Lechler’s design, and its immediate context, Speelberg helps illuminate the little understood but fundamental role of drawing in the design practice of Gothic artists and craftsmen across a range of disciplines.

Subscribe now (https://masterdrawings.org/subscribe/) and you can peruse online before receiving your mailed issue. Access to our digital platform is FREE with your individual subscription.

(Image: Lorenz Lechler and workshop, Detail from “Design for a Monumental Sacrament House,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

09/15/2025

“Claes Oldenburg: Drawn from Life,” at the Whitney Museum in New York, focuses on the artist’s drawings from the 1960s in which he playfully reimagined the spaces—streets, stores, homes—and objects of daily life. This selection from the Whitney’s extensive collection of Oldenburg's works on paper attests to his wide range as a draftsman and expanded definition of life drawing. Best known for his sculptures, his innovations emerged out of his drawing practice, which enabled him to swiftly record and transform the contours of the world around him.

(Image: Claes Oldenburg, “Icebox, 1963,” oil pastel, transparent and opaque watercolor, wax crayon and graphite pencil on paper, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York)

09/10/2025

Just two months remain to enter to win the $5,000 Ricciardi Prize!

The award is given for the best new and unpublished article on a drawing topic (of any period) by a scholar under the age of 40.

Winning submissions and finalists gain international recognition: your essay will be featured in the journal next year, with the opportunity to present your findings at the MASTER DRAWINGS annual symposium in New York. Research needs to be in article form and is due by November 15, 2025. Travel expenses to New York are covered by the journal.

Visit https://masterdrawings.org/ricciardi-prize/ for more information about requirements and how to apply. Also read about past winning topics and watch symposia from years past.

(Image: Attributed to Govaert Flinck, “Scholar seated at a table on which rests a large book,” pen and brown ink on laid paper, The Courtauld Gallery, London)

09/07/2025

“Rome - A Cardinal’s Dream,” at the Christ Church Picture Gallery at the University of Oxford, seeks to visualize what might have inspired Cardinal Thomas Wolsey’s aesthetic and artistic ambition. While Wolsey designed his college in Oxford, Raphael and Michelangelo left their marks on Rome. Wolsey never visited the city, but as a member of the papal court he admired Rome’s power and understood how it was expressed in its art and buildings. With Roman drawings of that time this exhibition, on view until October 20, creates a visual foil for a Roman Cardinal.

(Image: Giorgio Vasari, “Pope Leo X in procession, Passing through the Piazza della Signoria in Florence,” pen and brown wash over indications in rough black chalk, squared for enlargement in black chalk, Christ Church Picture Gallery, University of Oxford)

09/06/2025

The question of assessing quality is an essential, but infrequently discussed, topic in the field of drawings. To gain insights on how to approach this complicated endeavor join experts from our institutional partner, the Morgan Library & Museum, for the seminar “On Quality in Drawings, 1400 – 1900.” The seminar takes place on Monday, November 10 from 10:00am-4:00pm.

Led by John Marciari, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Department Head, Drawings and Prints, the forum aims to engage participants with the tools for evaluating the quality of a drawing, with attributed and unattributed examples by Italian, Northern European, French, and British artists. Marciari will be joined by Jennifer Tonkovich, Eugene and Clare Thaw Curator, and Sarah Mallory, Annette and Oscar de la Renta Assistant Curator. Through lively discussion, group work, and focused case studies, participants will emerge with a better sense of how to evaluate the quality of a drawing and the importance of such judgments in scholarship and curatorial work.

This seminar is open to graduate students of the history of art. The application deadline is September 30. Applications should be submitted electronically with the subject header “Quality in Drawings Seminar” to [email protected] and should include a one paragraph statement with name and email; academic institution and class year; field of study; and interest in drawings/relevance of the seminar to one’s research.
Participants will be notified by October 10.

(Image: Titian (Tiziano Vecellio), “Landscape with St. Theodore Overcoming the Dragon,” pen and brown ink, over black chalk, on paper, The Morgan Library & Museum)

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09/05/2025

“The Features of Genius,” at the International Perfume Museum in Grasse, showcases drawings from the Louvre by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, his son, Alexandre-Évariste Fragonard, and his sister-in-law, Marguerite Gérard.

Although Paris was Fragonard’s primary residence, he visited his hometown Grasse regularly. His wife, Marie-Anne Gérard, was also notably from a family of perfumers from the Provençal town. The exhibition features a selection of more than sixty drawings by Fragonard, never before exhibited in Grasse and rarely shown elsewhere. While his influence as a painter is well-recognized, Fragonard’s impact also extended to the decorative arts, particularly the world of perfumery, a field in which Grasse occupies a central place. To illustrate this connection, the exhibition, on view until October 26, presents a series of eighteenth-century porcelain perfume bottles on loan from the Givaudan company.

(Image: Fragonard, Jean-Honoré, “Ma Chemise Brûle (My Shirt is Burning),” brown wash over black chalk drawing, Louvre Museum, Paris)

09/03/2025

“Gathered Leaves: Discoveries from the Drawings Vault,” at the Audain Art Museum in Whistler, BC, Canada, a travelling exhibition that offers a rare glimpse into the hidden art treasures of the National Gallery of Canada. On view through October 13, the exhibition features over 130 works on paper and canvas by 84 artists, including Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Edgar Degas, Pablo Picasso, Gustav Klimt, Edvard Munch, Marc Chagall, Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun and Wassily Kandinsky. “Gathered Leaves” offers a compelling look at the diverse roles drawing has played across time, geography, and artistic movements.

(Image: Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, “Head of Giulio Contarini, after a Bust by Alessandro Vittoria,” red chalk heightened with white chalk on blue laid paper, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa)

09/02/2025

Get re-energized by diving into the latest issue of MASTER DRAWINGS (Vol. 63, no. 3). An eclectic group of articles features artists Lorenz Lechler, Pietro Perugino, Pieter Holsteyn II, Giuseppe Valeriani, and Jean-Baptiste Greuze. The issue also contains incisive reviews of recent exhibitions devoted to the drawings of Käthe Kollwitz, Picasso, and Walton Ford.

This quarter opens with a fascinating analysis of a rare and monumental design for a sacrament house attributed to the Late-Gothic German architect Lorenz Lechler followed by an insightful essay on a new addition to the corpus of drawings by Pietro Perugino: a preparatory study for two figures in the middle section of the “Baptism of Christ” in the Sistine Chapel.

The 2025 Ricciardi Prize winner presents research into a watercolor rendering of three insects, including an iridescent beetle, assigning the drawing to the seventeenth-century Dutch natural history artist Pieter Holsteyn II. An article attributing three drawings to the eighteenth-century vedutista Giuseppe Valeriani demonstrates that they are preparatory for an important series of etched views of Venice.

In the final essay, an exquisite pastel by Jean-Baptiste Greuze (featured on our cover) is brought to light. It had never been reproduced and its whereabouts had remained a mystery since the late 19th century.

Four exhibition and catalogue reviews complete this diverse issue:
• “Italian Renaissance Drawings from Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen” is deftly explored.
• A poignant overview of MoMA’s exhibition and catalogue “Käthe Kollwitz” is presented.
• “Picasso: Drawing Without End” at the Centre Pompidou is examined in one of our most in-depth reviews.
• A thoughtful analysis is presented of the exhibition “Walton Ford: Birds and Beasts of the Studio” at The Morgan Library & Museum.

Subscribe now and peruse online before receiving your mailed journal. Access to our platform is FREE with your individual subscription. https://masterdrawings.org/subscribe/

(Cover image: Jean-Baptiste Greuze, “Study for the Head of the Young Bride,”, Musée Angladon, Avignon)

09/01/2025

Join the curators behind the years-long traveling exhibition “Reimagining Revolution, Reform, and Restoration,” for enlightening presentations and a panel discussion about the French drawings from the Horvitz Collection. Organized by our partner, The Drawing Foundation, in partnership with the Crocker Art Museum, it takes place on Saturday, September 13 at 2pm at the museum in Sacramento.

Sarah Farkas, the Crocker’s Associate Curator of Art, will be joined by curators who worked closely on the different iterations of the exhibition at the Ackland Art Museum in Chapel Hill, NC and the Art Institute of Chicago. Attendees are encouraged to view the Crocker’s exhibition “Reform to Restoration: French Art from Louis XVI to Louis XVII from the Horvitz Collection” which closes on Sunday, September 14. The event is free for Crocker members and free with admission for nonmembers. Advance registration is suggested. Go to https://www.crockerart.org/events/3922/reform-to-restoration-panel

(Image: Joseph-Marie Vien, “Love Giving the Prize,” pen with black ink and brush with brown wash on off-white laid paper, The Horvitz Collection, Wilmington)

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