David Wrestling the Bear and the Lion
Second half of the XVIII century. Red chalk on laid paper.Not on display
This is a gridded drawing in black chalk. It depicts David, a shepherd, wrestling a bear. At his feet lies a dead lion, while another lion is fleeing with a sheep in its jaws. Other shepherds with their flocks surround David.
It is a copy of a painting by Luca Giordano, although its proportions are vertically modified. It is currently in the Royal Palace in Madrid.
It is the preparatory drawing for the cartoon that was to serve as a model for a tapestry in the Royal Factory. The inscription on the drawing refers not to Giordano’s original painting, but rather to the cartoon currently in Toledo Cathedral. The note of dimensions in Italian may have been done by C. Giaquinto, who directed and supervised all the work of the Royal Tapestry Factory between 1760–2. This date is the presumed date of the preparation and weaving of the tapestries in the David series. If this were the case, the drawing’s attribution to Castillo would have to be discarded, as he was in Italy at the time. Nevertheless, because the documentation of the Royal Tapestry Factory is far from conclusive, the attribution can be accepted. It can be assumed that these tapestries were prepared after 1764, as is precisely stated for the tapestry on the History of Joseph, the drawing for which is also kept at the Museo del Prado (D000673), as was already pointed out by Sambricio. Nonetheless, it should be mentioned that the technique of this drawing seems slightly different from the others by Castillo and that –as M.C. García Saseta has observed– Giaquinto’s pupil, Guillermo de Anglois, appears to have copied two paintings by Jordá, the subjects of which are not specified.
Pérez Sánchez, Alfonso Emilio, Museo del Prado Catálogo de Dibujos T. III. Dibujos Españoles, Siglo XVIII C-Z, Madrid, Museo del Prado, 1977, p.27
