Study of a Kneeling Nude Girl for The Entombment

[3] Lateral strokes were placed at the bottom to indicate the ground plane, and touches of white body color were added to details of the figure.

Rare for a drawing by Michelangelo is the pink ground,[3] in this case achieved by rubbing crushed red chalk onto the paper.

[4] Because the use of nude female models was controversial, relatively few such drawings were made before the 17th century, when academic life classes were established.

Exceptions from the Italian Renaissance include Raphael, who made nude drawings, apparently of his mistress, and Lorenzo Lotto, who recorded in his account book having used women of ill repute as life models.

[1] In Florence, Michelangelo and Raphael initiated the practice of making preparatory studies of the nude prior to painting the figure fully clothed, in order to better understand the underlying structure of the body.