File:Drawing (BM SL,5218.12).jpg

Height: 53 millimetres

Width: 75 millimetres

Summary of J.Rowlands 'Drawings by German Artists and Artists from German- speaking regions of Europe in the Department of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum: the Fifteenth Century,and the Sixteenth Century by Artists born before 1530', London, BM Press, 1993, no. 257:

Opinion has been divided about the status of this drawing, and while Dodgson and the Tietzes rejected the attribution, Lippmann and Winkler accepted it, linking it with the group of small drawings also on vellum done in 1520 (SL,5218.11; SL,5218.13; SL,5218.10; SL,5218.143). Its execution is, however, less bold than these; which could suggest that Dürer drew it on the spur of the moment. The contrived composition seems also to have induced a certain stiffness in the handling, which may have been the factor which prompted some authorities to reject it and to propose that it is by another artist altogether. A link with Sebald Beham on the basis of his engravings of peasant life (such as Pauli, 'Beham', i, p. 194, no. 192, repr.) suggested by the Tietzes is stylistically unconvincing. Similarly Winkler's hint, taken up by Strauss, that SL,5218.12 could be by Simon Bening (c. 1483-1561), the leading Flemish miniaturist of the first half of the sixteenth century, cannot be substantiated by a comparison with any of his acknowledged works. Rowlands felt inclined to consider it a rather tentative drawing by Dürer himself, but it is more likely to be done by a follower in imitation of his style.