Three Male Heads

Three Male Heads

Baccio Bandinelli

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The subject of this powerful drawing with the head of a man seen in three stages—youth, maturity, and old age—is elusive. Various interpretations have been suggested, from the Ages of Man to an allegory of past, present, and future. The central figure may have been intended as an idealized self-portrait of the artist, the Florentine sculptor and draftsman Baccio Bandinelli. The portrayal of the three heads on the same scale from three different points of view–to the left, frontally, and in profile to the right—betrays Bandinelli's interest in the description of forms in the round, an approach suited to his main occupation, sculpture. The juxtaposition of overlapping heads, turned at various angles, seems to have been a recurring theme in Bandinelli's drawn oeuvre (see: Yale University Art Gallery inv. 1975.101.10; Nationalmuseum, Stockholm inv. 128; National Museum, Cracow inv. XV-1959 and Art Institute of Chicago inv. 1996.606).

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.