177 - Lorenzo Bartolini John Flaxman, Sketchbook of Sketches and Drawings Based on John Flaxman’s Inventions. ca. 1800. Oblong album in 16° (145x220 mm). Green half-leather binding with gold decoration on the spine; marbled paper covers. 47 sheets with applied tissue paper depicting Greek costumes and line drawings in black pencil and graphite pencil, some inspired by the metopes of the Parthenon. Based on designs by John Flaxman. In the late 18th century, during his apprenticeship in Volterra at the workshop of the alabaster craftsman Barthélemy Corneille, the young Bartolini saw for the first time John Flaxman’s line engravings for the illustrations of the *Iliad* and the *Odyssey*, as well as Aeschylus’s tragedies. Flaxman’s clean line made a profound impression on the artist, who, in 1799, when he moved to Paris and joined Jacques-Louis David’s studio, discovered that Flaxman’s drawings were also a point of reference among young French artists, including his friend Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. The English artist’s “pure line” perfectly aligned with the ideal of formal purity that Bartolini would develop in his own personal style. (1) Binding shows signs of wear. Illustrations have sporadic foxing spots and slight signs of aging.