Study of Pendentives with Figures of Evangelists

The drawing depicts three Evangelists: Saint John, recognizable by the eagle,
Saint Matthew with the angel and, on the verso, Saint Mark with the lion,
alongside further studies for the same figures. The sheet was published in
1979 by Giulio Bora (1), who attributed it to the hand of Carlo Urbino; the
scholar identified it as a preparatory study for the pendentives of the dome in
the Church of Santa Maria di Campagna in Pallanza, commissioned from the
artist around 1576-1577. The decoration of the sacred building was divided
equally between Urbino and Aurelio Luini, who were later joined by assistants
and other painters due to concurrent commissions undertaken by both
masters. Of the four pendentives to be frescoed with the Evangelists, two
were assigned to Urbino (Saint John and Saint Matthew) and two to Luini
(Saint Mark and Saint Luke). It is therefore probable that the two artists were
developing their decorative proposals simultaneously: this would explain the
sketch for Saint Mark on the reverse of the sheet, studied by Urbino at a stage
prior to the final division of the subjects.