Two Grotesque Heads

Francesco Melzi after Leonardo da Vinci

National Gallery of Art

An older man and woman with exaggerated facial features are shown from the chest up as they face each other in profile in this horizontal drawing on tan paper. To our left, the woman has a protruding, deeply wrinkled face with a blunt nose, squinting eyes, and a dramatically downturned mouth. Loose folds of skin sag down her neck and chest. She wears a C-shaped headdress with a loosely drawn veil hanging down the back. A delicate flower sticks out of the ample, wrinkled decolletage encased in her low-cut bodice. The man opposite her has deep-set eyes over a long, hooked nose and a lumpy, potato-like chin jutting out from his craggy face. His hair is covered by a headdress with a padded brim. A long scarf drapes over his head and across his chest. His shoulders and back are suggested by a few short pen strokes.