This beautiful study of a hand, executed in red chalk with white highlights on blue paper, is characteristic of Tiepolo's drawn work. This preparatory drawing represents the right hand of Venus in the painting "Venus and Vulcan" housed in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The artist quickly notes his ideas while creating a brilliant study of details. Only the position of the middle finger differs in the final painting.

Giovanni Battista's use of red chalk is particularly virtuosic here: the modeling of the hand is suggested by numerous subtle details that create a vivid and realistic rendering. The sheet finds a close comparison in another study of a hand from the Jan Krugier Foundation, revealing a similar and bold use of red chalk, combined with fine touches of white on blue paper.

A study of a young boy's head, his cheek resting in his right hand, also made on blue paper with red chalk and white highlights, shows a homogeneous style with our sheet. Both possess the immediacy and vitality of studies done from life, particularly in the treatment of the hand, where the modeling is achieved through fine hatching and white highlights that catch the light.

A mature work from his Madrid period (1762-1770), this preparatory study demonstrates great technical mastery. Using a vigorous and subtle red chalk line, the volume of the hand pressing under its weight on a fabric is brought to life on the sheet, giving life to the flesh.

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, undoubtedly the most eminent artist of 18th-century Venetian painting, has captured here the grace and power of the divine feminine figure, adding a new dimension to his vast graphic corpus of more than 2000 sheets admired in his lifetime.