Description: Numbered in pen and brown ink in the upper left corner: 1169, and in the lower right corner: 238 (Sparre) and 160 (struck out)
A composition drawing for an altarpiece in S. Giuliano in Perugia, now in the Pinacotheca Vanucci there. The symbolic eagle is a free-hand addition without the rest of the drawing's black-chalk underdrawing: some accents have been reinforced with a different ink. Moreover, the drawing does not include the painting's rich landscape background. The similarity with the pose of Pythagoras in Raphael's "School of Athens", begun in 1508, was pointed out by Sirén and has also been descerned by later writers. It is conceivable that the figure stems from a study by Raphael, particularly as Gualdi has shown that the scenes on the predella of the altarpiece are partly derived from him.
Berto is mentioned as a pupil or assistant in Perugino's studio in 1495; in 1505 he and Raphael were contracted to paint an altarpiece for the Clarissine Convent in Monteluce. Raphael, ten years his junior, exerted a strong influence and Berto had access to his drawings. Berto executed a painting, for instance, that used Raphael's preparatory drawing for the predella of the Oddi altar, representing the Adoration of the Magi, from 1503; Berto's painting includes details that Raphael omitted from his painting.
Gualdi argued for a revival of this sheet's traditional attribution to Raphael but the present use of crosshatching and the contours of folds is too superficial and monotonous, instead of being subordinated to the definition of volumes and the impression of movement. The manner is more reminiscent of Timoteo Viti and seems to be typical of these Umbrian followers of Perugino. [Bjurström, It. Drawings, cat. no. 398]

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Berto Giovanni | Evangelisten Johannes | Nationalmuseum