Standing Male Nude

Executed in elegant, calligraphic pen strokes with translucent washes, this drawing exemplifies Van Mander’s command over the human form. The male nude is shown with his back turned toward the viewer, resting his right hand on a stick and holding a piece of drapery. Although these are the traditional trappings of a lifedrawing session, the figure in the Abrams drawing must have been conjured up from imagination and memory, not direct observation. This is evident in the simplified rendering of the man’s musculature and his overall stance. Raising his left foot and holding the stick at a sharp angle to the floor, the model would have struggled to keep his balance. Unusually for Van Mander, who rarely signed his study drawings, the sheet includes a large monogram at lower right, suggesting that the artist considered this drawing to be a finished work of art in its own right.