Saint Peter released from prison

Piola represented the same subject, with some differences, in another drawing in Palazzo Rosso (inv. 2640) and in a painting in Castiglione Chiavarese (for both see A. Toncini Cabella, Paolo Gerolamo Piola e la sua grande casa genovese, Genoa, 2002, no. 1, ill.). This large sheet is very similar in format, style and technique to another drawing by Paolo Gerolamo Piola of The Toilet of Bathsheba at the Morgan Library and Museum (inv. 1980.71). Both sheets come from the important collection of the eminent cellist János Scholz, whose collector’s stamp with his initials on a bass stave is at lower left.