Four male heads

A photograph of a drawing by an artist from the circle of Perugino, formerly attributed to Raphael; part of the Libretto Veneziano, now in the Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice (f.15r). The head at lower left is copied from a drawing by Raphael currently housed in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (inv. no.WA1846.156 r; a photograph at RCIN 851367). This drawing features various studies on the verso (see RCIN 851368 for a photograph of the verso).

This drawing is part of the so-called Libretto di Raffaello or Libretto Veneziano, 53 sheets that used to be mounted in a volume. After complicated negotiations, the sketchbook was bought by the Accademia in the 1820s, after the death of Giuseppe Bossi, who was its previous owner. A number of scholars debated the author of the drawings (with many names proposed, such as Pinturicchio, Antonio da Viterbo, Eusebio del Giorgio, Girolamo Genga) and their date. In 1984, the drawings were catalogued as by an artist contemporary to Raphael, whose juvenile works he copied in this sketchbook (see Bibliographic References).