Study of Two Heads
Artist: Peter Paul Rubens (Belgian, 1577–1640)
Original Dimensions: 27 1/2" x 20 1/2"
Location: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
About Artwork: (ca. 1609) "Rubens painted studies of heads after live models and artistic sources, creating a cast of characters that served in turn as models for figures in religious and mythological works. The main figure of this study served variously as a saint, a high priest, a river god, and the philosopher Plato. The other head, derived from one by Mantegna, had its own artistic afterlife. Rubens’s disciples Jacob Jordaens and especially Anthony van Dyck followed the same practice." - (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

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