A Man Stricken by the Plague

This drawing is a copy of a figure in Jacopo Bassano's altarpiece 'St Roche blessing the Plague Stricken', now in the Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan (Inv. 133). The altarpiece was originally in the Church of San Rocco, Vicenza and is dated shortly after 1575. Some scholars have suggested that the drawing itself dates from after the 16th century. This is one of the artworks presented by the Liverpool Royal Institution. Liverpool’s economic development grew directly from Britain’s involvement with transatlantic slavery: the kidnapping, enslavement and forced migration of people from West Africa to the Americas and many to the Caribbean. Many members of the Royal Institution made their fortunes directly through the trade or indirectly through the wider economy. This wealth was largely how they were able to bring rare art and treasures, such as this, to the city.