Study of a Young Woman Playing a Tambourine, and Studies of an Arm, Hands, and Feet (Studies for "Miriam Leading the Chorus of Women Who Give Thanks for the Routing of Pharoah" (c. 1711): Art, History

Study of a Young Woman Playing a Tambourine, and Studies of an Arm, Hands, and Feet (Studies for "Miriam Leading the Chorus of Women Who Give Thanks for the Routing of Pharoah" (c. 1711) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Marcantonio Franceschini (Italian, 1648–1729).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This sheet of studies in red chalk was made in preparation for the composition Miriam Leading the Chorus of Women Who Give Thanks for the Routing of Pharaoh, a final episode in the story of the Israelites' exodus from Egypt. The Bolognese artist Marcantonio Franceschini painted the cartoon of the complete composition between 1711 and 1712, and it was used to decorate an important papal building, the Palazzo della Cancelleria in Rome, where it remains today. While the studies of feet and the head and shoulders with raised arms are for the principal figure of Miriam playing the tambourine, the arm on the right and the two hands holding a rod are studies for an attendant figure who plays the triangle behind Miriam.

Object facts

• Title: Study of a Young Woman Playing a Tambourine, and Studies of an Arm, Hands, and Feet (Studies for "Miriam Leading the Chorus of Women Who Give Thanks for the Routing of Pharoah"
• Date: c. 1711
• Creator attribution: Marcantonio Franceschini (Italian, 1648–1729)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Drawing
• Technique: red chalk
• Dimensions: Sheet: 25.3 x 35.1 cm (9 15/16 x 13 13/16 in.); Secondary Support: 31.6 x 43.6 cm (12 7/16 x 17 3/16 in.)
• Collection: DR - Italian
• Department: Drawings
• Accession number: 2003.7

Collection credit

Gift of Nancy West

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.