The Apotheosis of Romulus: Design for a Ceiling
Medium
Black chalk, pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash, heightened with white, with perspectival indications
Dimensions
24 × 37.7 cm
Classification
Drawing
Department
Drawings
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund
Accession Number
2017.104
Tags
About this artwork
Domenico Maria Canuti made this design for a quadratura ceiling fresco in preparation for a commission at the Palazzo Altieri in Rome. Quadratura describes painting in which architectural elements are painted to appear to be part of the real architectural setting. Canuti focused on establishing the visual coherence between the figures, portraying the deification of Rome’s founder, and the painted architecture by drawing perspective lines at 90-degree and 45-degree angles. The perfectly rendered ...