Portrait of Jean Niquet
Hendrick Goltzius made this preparatory drawing for the engraved portrait of the merchant Jean Niquet in metalpoint, in this case with a lead stylus. Quite unusually he often drew in metalpoint. In his time, this technique had fallen out of favour and people preferred to draw with pen, brush, and chalk. One possible explanation is that Goltzius did this out of admiration for Albrecht Dürer, who had worked a great deal in silverpoint.