The double-sided sheet of black chalk studies of male nudes probably dates from 1504 when Michelangelo was working on "The Battle of Cascina," commissioned for a wall opposite Leonardo's "Battle of Anghiari" in the Palazzo della Signoria, Florence. The fresco commemorating a Florentine victory over Pisan troops in 1364 went unfinished when Michelangelo was called to Rome by Pope Julius II in 1505. Neither painting survives.
The sheet is the last of 24 surviving preparatory studies for the fresco that remains in private hands and has been in the same private collection for more than 30 years, said Christie's.
Owners of trophy-name Old Master drawings have been encouraged after a series of record prices, such as the 29.2 million pounds ($47.6 million) paid for Raphael's black chalk "Head of a Muse" at Christie's in December 2009.
The record auction price for a Michelangelo drawing is the 8.1 million pounds paid for a pen-and-ink study of "The Risen Christ" at Christie's in July 2000. The successful bidder on that Michelangelo and Raphael's "Muse" was the New York collector Leon Black, said dealers.
"It's an interesting drawing," London-based dealer Jean- Luc Baroni, who underbid the record-breaking Raphael, said of the work for sale in July. "Still, it doesn't have the intensity of some the artist's other studies."
(Scott Reyburn writes about the art market for Muse, the arts and culture section of Bloomberg News. Opinions expressed are his own.)