17. Jean Chaufourrier
(1679-1757)

Solfatara

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Chaufourrier, Solfatara

Solfatara

Red chalk, ca. 1712, 132 x 210 mm. A fine, precise but fluent drawing on laid paper, inscribed "Solphatar" in brown ink, tipped down to a sheet of old ledger paper which is numbered 6 in the same ink as the title. Solfatara is a sulfurous volcano near Naples. A group of black chalk drawings of Rome by Chaufourrier, similarly inscribed, was sold at Sotheby's London, Dec. 7, 1967. Chaufourrier, whose primary work was exactly the sort of topographical drawing as this sheet, was the drawing teacher of Jean-Pierre Mariette.