The light black strokes of the metalpoint form a contrast with the equally precise strokes of white body color. They give the portrait a subtly ethereal quality that is missing in the painting. There, the softness gives way to the faintest suggestion of sentimentality in a painted image that is as perfect as it is academic. Yet, Perugino's proneness to scrutinize human feelings of the most complex nature when sketching is not in doubt. The likeness of a middle-age member of the establishment, probably by him and, if not, by an artist from his immediate circle, points to a penetrating understanding of the sitter's moral plight.
Bags appear under the man's tired eyes.
The eyebrows are ever so slightly knitted and the lips closed, giving the bloated face a striking expression of reproachful bitterness. This is a study in distress and solitude. Sketches in that mood apparently left a profound impression on Raphael. Around 1503, shortly after his presumed stint in Perugino's atelier, Raphael drew in black chalk the double portrait of an aging man with sunken eyes and a shock of unruly wavy hair. The plunging nose and the lower lip, protruding slightly, suggest determination and weariness all at once.