EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND.- The Queen's Gallery, Palace of Holyroodhouse presents Holbein to Hockney: Drawings From the Royal Collection through March 6, 2005. The Royal Collection contains one of the world's greatest collections of drawings, assembled over the last 500 years. Since the 16th century, drawings have been collected by those who appreciate the spontaneity of the sketch and the ability to see every trace of the artist's hand, providing a fascinating insight into the creative process. Because of their fragility and sensitivity to light, they have customarily been preserved on the pages of albums or in portfolios, and kept with printed books in libraries. The 75 examples selected for this exhibition have been chosen to represent every important group of drawings from the Royal Library at Windsor Castle.

From quick sketches to finished presentation works, the exhibition covers every type of drawing practised in Europe since the Renaissance, including compositions for paintings, studies from the model, portraits, landscapes and observations from nature. Among the highlights are a rare drawing by Luca Signorelli of Hercules and Antaeus; a sensitive study of a greyhound by Albrecht Dürer, the only surviving preparatory study for his engraving The Vision of St Eustace; Leonardo da Vinci's cataclysmic image of A deluge; Nicolas Poussin's The Triumph of Pan; and A view on the Grand Canal by Canaletto.

The royal drawings collection has been shaped by the personal tastes of kings and queens who have bought or commissioned works over the last five centuries. The first drawings recorded in royal ownership, on the death of Henry VIII in 1547, are Hans Holbein's penetrating portraits of the King's courtiers. These remain among the greatest treasures of the Royal Library. The chalk studies of Sir Thomas More and Cicely Heron in the exhibition are preparatory works for Holbein's lost portrait of More and his family.

It was not until the reign of Charles II (r.1660-85) that the collecting of drawings began in earnest. Charles II's taste was primarily for the Italian High Renaissance, and his finest acquisition was an unrivalled group of Leonardo da Vinci's drawings. These are represented in the exhibition by four exquisite studies of the natural world, showing the extraordinary breadth of the artist's enquiring mind. Two drawings in black chalk contrast the styles of two other Renaissance masters - the beauty and grace of Raphael's study of Poetry for the Vatican Stanze and the power and muscularity of Michelangelo's The Risen Christ.

The most spectacular additions to the royal drawings collection were made by George III (r.1760-1820). The prevailing taste at the time was for the Italian Baroque, and, with his purchase of Cardinal Alessandro Albani's collection, the King acquired works by the greatest artists of the 17th century, including Bernini, the Carracci, Domenichino, Poussin and Claude. The King's other outstanding acquisition was the collection of Consul Joseph Smith, which brought into royal ownership outstanding groups of drawings by contemporary Venetian artists - Canaletto, Sebastiano and Marco Ricci, and Piazzetta. The King also purchased many important northern European drawings, and works by Van Dyck, Charles le Brun and Jacob van Ruisdael are shown in the exhibition.

George III had a passion for natural history. His first acquisition, at the age of 16, was a group of exquisite studies of flowers and insects by Maria Sibylla Merian that included A citron with a moth and a harlequin beetle. This was soon followed by the purchase of Mark Catesby's watercolours for his Natural History of North America and of Cassiano dal Pozzo's collection, among this the studies of plants and animals from the 'paper museum'.

Queen Victoria gave a personal focus to the royal collection of drawings. As mementoes of their lives together, she and Prince Albert commissioned hundreds of watercolours by leading artists such as Carl Haag, Louis Haghe and William Wyld for their Souvenir Albums. Their children followed this example, taking artists with them on foreign tours, and the exhibition includes watercolours documenting the travels in Egypt and India of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales.

During the 20th century, gifts by organisations such as the Royal Academy have added modern drawings to the collection, including A wardrobe room by Dame Laura Knight and A horse by Dame Elizabeth Frink. The most notable commissions have been the series of drawn portraits of members of the Order of Merit initiated by King Edward VII, which includes the powerful charcoal study of Henry James by John Singer Sargent. This practice was revived by Her Majesty The Queen in 1987, and the pencil portrait of Lord Rothschild by David Hockney is one of the latest additions to the Royal Collection.