The 50 plates / Plate 48 of 50

Plate 48 of 50
The Holy Family
Heilige Familie
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
Not yet located
The drawing
A freely executed biblical composition showing the Virgin Mary seated at the center, with the Christ Child standing before her and reaching toward her chest. An elderly, bearded Saint Joseph leans toward them from the right, while a tree rises behind the group. Swift, expressive pen strokes and loosely applied brown washes define the figures and drapery, leaving much of the background unfinished. The intimate arrangement emphasizes the interaction between mother and child.
Becker, 1922
As Felix Becker published it in 1922.
- Attribution
- Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
- Title as printed
- Heilige Familie
- Title in English
- The Holy Family
- Medium and size
- Pen over pencil, gray-yellow washes, 27.5 × 22 cm
- Collection in 1922
- Julius Böhler jun., Munich
Today
Modern cataloguing and the drawing’s whereabouts, as far as they are known.
- Status
- Not yet located
- Where is it now?
- Not yet located. No post-Becker museum or auction record has been securely identified with this drawing.
- Attribution today
- Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, as attributed by Becker. No independent modern attribution of this exact drawing has been verified.
The sheet in this copy
Sources
- Felix Becker, Handzeichnungen alter Meister in Privatsammlungen (Leipzig, 1922), plate 48.
- No later museum or auction record has been securely identified with this drawing so far.

