Massacre of the Innocents, 17th century (black chalk, pen & brown ink, brown wash on...

Formerly attributed to Alonso Cano (1601-67). Collectors of Spanish drawings greatly admired the works of Alonso Cano, which accounts for the incorrect attribution of this scene to him in the inscription. Instead, the composition, dominated by a strong diagonal, and the particularly aggressive rendering of the violent subject, showing a mother’s brave effort to protect her son from being murdered by a powerful soldier, is characteristic of the Valencian artist Esteban March, whose early biographers commented upon his furious temper and his preference for battle scenes.