Study for a Massacre of the Innocents
1560–1636
Medium
Black chalk, pen and bistre with gray-brown washes
Dimensions
sheet: 7 3/8 x 5 in. (18.7 x 12.7 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Harry G. Friedman, 1957
Accession Number
57.658.281
Tags
Art Historical Context
Domenico Cresti, as Passignano (156–1636), was a prominent Florentine painter bridging the late Mannerist and early Baroque periods. This intimate drawing, *Study for a Massacre of Innocents*, captures the chaotic biblical tragedy from the Gospel of Matthew, where King Herod orders the slaughter of infant boys in Bethlehem to eliminate the infant Jesus. Created as a preparatory sketch, it exemplifies Passignano's skill in composing dynamic human figures amid violence, a theme popular in Renaissance and Baroque art to evoke emotional intensity during the Counter-Reformation era. Executed in bl...