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In contrast to many comparable likenesses captured in Adolph Menzel’s sketchbooks, the man depicted in this triple study was surely aware that the artist was portraying him. Nonetheless, the young man with his moustache and metal-rimmed glasses continues to stare off at an occurrence unknown to us; perhaps this was at the command of the artist, who was clearly interested in viewing this striking profile from both the left and the right.
Unfortunately, the sitter has yet to be identified. However, he was probably a Berliner, as Adolph Menzel spent the year 1877 in his native city, apart from a summer journey to Regensburg and the Salzkammergut in Austria.