Jacopo Ligozzi was a subtle, versatile draughtsman, held in high esteem in his day. Versed in technique and imagination and discerning in graphic transposition, Ligozzi was so attentive to detail that he often defined himself a miniaturist and considered drawing an art, complete in itself, equal in dignity to painting. The collection of the Cabinet des Dessins documents many of the artist's interests, spanning almost half a century of work. Arriving in 1577 at the court of Francesco I de' Medici, Ligozzi devoted himself to naturalistic drawing, provided ideas for engravings, illustrated themes by Dante and on a series of moral subjects. The work of this Veronese artist expresses the most advanced production of late international Mannerist court splendour, already incurably tinged with Counter Reformation anxieties. A number of Parisian sheets are linked to the artist's pictorial production, often being the sole evidence of lost works. Two groups of suggestive drawings relate to a cycle of cartouches on the subject of death, showing a whole generation's fondness for that theme and the personal reflections of the master, who in his old age studied and meditated on the Passion of Christ under the spiritual guidance of one of his sons, a Dominican priest.