Allegory of Penance and Death

A long horizontal pen-and-ink drawing shows skeletal figures and nude men crowded around a stone altar and architectural forms on the right. Figures writhe and kneel across the sheet, with dense hatching in the shadows. Faint black chalk traces suggest an underdrawing beneath the brown ink.

Look closer: A small monogram or signature mark sits in the lower right corner of the sheet.

Artist

Pietro Testa

Date

1612–50

Medium

Pen and brown ink, over traces of black chalk

Source

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Size

4000 × 1603 px

Credit (appreciated, not required for public-domain works): The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1973