Pompeo Batoni was one of the foremost religious painters working in Rome in the 18th century. This sheet of studies was preparatory for his painting Saint Bartholomew (1740/45; private collection, Rome). It was part of a series of canvases representing Christ’s apostles commissioned by Count Cesare Merenda, Batoni’s most dedicated patron, for his gallery in the town of Forlì in central Italy—the Art Institute owns the Saint Andrew oil. The presence of squaring in red chalk suggests the studies on this sheet were ready to be transferred to the canvas.