Venus reclining and Cupid asleep (recto); Venus reclining (verso)

The figure of Venus and the drapery closely relate to A woman sleeping, a painting en grisaille in Bologna's communal collections E. Riccòmini et al., in Donato Creti: Melancholy and Perfection, exhib. cat., New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1998-9, p. 79, ill.). Cupid has, however, been omitted from the painting. It is one of a series of eight tempera paintings made for Marcantonio Collina Sbaraglia in the 1720s which were presented to the city of Bologna in 1744. A primo pensiero for the picture is in the Koenig-Fachsenfeld collection, Saatgalerie Stuttgart, Graphische Sammlung (M. Riccòmini, Donato Creti: Le opere su carta: Catalogo Ragionato, Turin, 2012, no. 84.5).

Marco Riccòmini, to whom we are grateful, has suggested that this drawing is a contemporary copy after the picture. For other drawings considered to be copies after the same pictures, see M.Riccòmini, op. cit., nos. 12.2 and 22.40).