This reclining nude is certainly a highly refined and effectively naturalistic study for the figure of Abel, most likely a preparatory work for the large canvas The Death of Abel, which is also connected to the other sketch, still in the Gallery of Modern Art in Palazzo Pitti (Cat. Gen. no. 558), depicting Cain. The finished painting, of which a graphic study of the composition is preserved in the Cabinet of Prints and Drawings of the Uffizi (GDSU, inv. 19233F), was commissioned in 1846 by Antonio Sarti and brought to America the very same year, but unfortunately has so far been lost.

Excerpt of the expertise by doc. Elena Marconi