Flemish School circa 1600

In this complex and highly original composition, we see to the left a group of allegorical female figures, representing all the various arts, while further back and to the right, the artist has depicted the practical application of these arts.  In a veritable hive of industry, we see a painter at work, his efforts being admired and discussed by a group of onlookers, a sculptor furiously chiselling out a figure, a draughtsman recording the scene, and scholars and geographers discussing globes and books (one group on a balcony overhead). 

The drawing was formerly thought to originate from the School of Fontainebleau, and was at one point attributed to Antoine Caron, but although the precise and highly detailed penwork explains why this suggestion was made, there are no really convincing parallels in any Fontainebleau school drawings for the figure types of the allegorical ladies to the left, who seem much more in the Flemish tradition.