AFTER GIAMBOLOGNA (1529-1608)- A BRONZE FIGURE OF MARS
ITALO-FLEMISH, 17TH CENTURY
On an ebonised wooden base, inset with lapis lazuli panels
figure 38cm high, 53.5cm high overall, base 17.5cm wide
Provenance:
Private collection, Germany.
Exhibited:
BRONZES DE LA RENAISSANCE, Association Royale Des Demeures Historiques De Belgique, Chateau De Laarne September-October 1967. No.73 "Ecole de Jean Boulogne, Hercule Marchant". Pp.110, illustrated page 111.
This bronze depicts a muscular nude male figure striding forward with his right foot, his left arm and hand outstretched, whilst his right hand would have originally held a sword. The bearded head, with the mouth partly open, is sharply turned to the left, whilst the body is represented in a diagonally upward rising movement - the Mannerist figura serpentinata. Designed to be seen in the round, the muscular figure is presented in a carefully calculated, complex stance: by means of the outstretched arms, the striding motion and the emphatic rotation of the upper body, the figure dominates the surrounding space.
Mars, or Gladiator as it was sometimes referred to in the early literature, was one of Giambologna's most popular models. The Flemish artist Jean Boulogne (1529-1608), better known by his Italianised name Giambologna, was the most influential Mannerist sculptor in Europe. Giambologna's first encounter with Italy, his adoptive land, happened in 1550 when the young artist set off to Rome to study the great works of antiquity and the masters of the Renaissance. On his way back home, he stopped in Florence where he enjoyed the patronage of the influential Florentine aristocrat Bernardo Vecchietti (1514-1590). Vecchietti's contacts, together with Giambologna's innate talent, eventually led to his introduction to the ruling Medici Grand Dukes. His first Medicean commission (1560) was the seminal marble group of Samson slaying a Philistine, now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (inv. A.7-1954), completed for the future Grand Duke Francesco I (1541-1587), who appointed him as court sculptor a year later in 1561. It was in this decade that Giambologna began producing bronzes, later setting up his workshop and own foundry at Borgo Pinti. His exquisite small bronze statuettes, avidly collected by European connoisseurs and often used by the Medici as diplomatic gifts, disseminated his sophisticated style throughout the courts of Europe.
Further carrying his vocabulary across the Alps were the numerous Northern European pupils who trained in his workshop, most notably Adriaen de Vries (1556-1626), Pierre de Francqueville (1548-1615), Hans Reichle (1570-1642), and Hubert Gerhard (1540-1620). A versatile, innovative and prolific sculptor, who produced extraordinarily varied compositions - from mythological scenes to images of the crucified Christ - Giambologna dominated Florentine sculpture in the second half of the sixteenth-century and had an enormous influence on his contemporaries, one that was re-echoed in the seventeenth century by the later generations.
The most accurately documented example of this composition was given by Giambologna himself to Christian I, Elector of Saxony (1560-1591) (formerly in the collection of Bayer AG, the statuette, known as the 'Dresden Mars', was acquired by the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (SKD) in 2018). The bronze is first documented in the 1587 inventory of the Elector's Dresden Kunstkammer as 'a picture of Mars cast in brass, given by Johan Pollonia [sic] to his Grace the Elector' - this is the first use of the name Mars. Other remarkable examples include the bronze initialled I.B. (standing for Giambologna's Latin name - Iohannes Bononiensis) in the collection of the Power Corporation of Canada, Montreal, the cast in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, and The Hohenzollern Mars, sold by Tomasso in 2016.
The quality of the present cast, which displays a meticulous attention to detail and surface texture, together with the brassy alloy of the metal and the distinctive facial features, all point to its production in a North European foundry, probably in Germany or the Netherlands.
AFTER GIAMBOLOGNA (1529-1608)- A BRONZE FIGURE OF MARS
ITALO-FLEMISH, 17TH CENTURY
On an ebonised wooden base, inset with lapis lazuli panels
figure 38cm high, 53.5cm high overall, base 17.5cm wide
Provenance:
Private collection, Germany.
Exhibited:
BRONZES DE LA RENAISSANCE, Association Royale Des Demeures Historiques De Belgique, Chateau De Laarne September-October 1967. No.73 "Ecole de Jean Boulogne, Hercule Marchant". Pp.110, illustrated page 111.
This bronze depicts a muscular nude male figure striding forward with his right foot, his left arm and hand outstretched, whilst his right hand would have originally held a sword. The bearded head, with the mouth partly open, is sharply turned to the left, whilst the body is represented in a diagonally upward rising movement - the Mannerist figura serpentinata. Designed to be seen in the round, the muscular figure is presented in a carefully calculated, complex stance: by means of the outstretched arms, the striding motion and the emphatic rotation of the upper body, the figure dominates the surrounding space.
Mars, or Gladiator as it was sometimes referred to in the early literature, was one of Giambologna's most popular models. The Flemish artist Jean Boulogne (1529-1608), better known by his Italianised name Giambologna, was the most influential Mannerist sculptor in Europe. Giambologna's first encounter with Italy, his adoptive land, happened in 1550 when the young artist set off to Rome to study the great works of antiquity and the masters of the Renaissance. On his way back home, he stopped in Florence where he enjoyed the patronage of the influential Florentine aristocrat Bernardo Vecchietti (1514-1590). Vecchietti's contacts, together with Giambologna's innate talent, eventually led to his introduction to the ruling Medici Grand Dukes. His first Medicean commission (1560) was the seminal marble group of Samson slaying a Philistine, now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (inv. A.7-1954), completed for the future Grand Duke Francesco I (1541-1587), who appointed him as court sculptor a year later in 1561. It was in this decade that Giambologna began producing bronzes, later setting up his workshop and own foundry at Borgo Pinti. His exquisite small bronze statuettes, avidly collected by European connoisseurs and often used by the Medici as diplomatic gifts, disseminated his sophisticated style throughout the courts of Europe.
Further carrying his vocabulary across the Alps were the numerous Northern European pupils who trained in his workshop, most notably Adriaen de Vries (1556-1626), Pierre de Francqueville (1548-1615), Hans Reichle (1570-1642), and Hubert Gerhard (1540-1620). A versatile, innovative and prolific sculptor, who produced extraordinarily varied compositions - from mythological scenes to images of the crucified Christ - Giambologna dominated Florentine sculpture in the second half of the sixteenth-century and had an enormous influence on his contemporaries, one that was re-echoed in the seventeenth century by the later generations.
The most accurately documented example of this composition was given by Giambologna himself to Christian I, Elector of Saxony (1560-1591) (formerly in the collection of Bayer AG, the statuette, known as the 'Dresden Mars', was acquired by the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (SKD) in 2018). The bronze is first documented in the 1587 inventory of the Elector's Dresden Kunstkammer as 'a picture of Mars cast in brass, given by Johan Pollonia [sic] to his Grace the Elector' - this is the first use of the name Mars. Other remarkable examples include the bronze initialled I.B. (standing for Giambologna's Latin name - Iohannes Bononiensis) in the collection of the Power Corporation of Canada, Montreal, the cast in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, and The Hohenzollern Mars, sold by Tomasso in 2016.
The quality of the present cast, which displays a meticulous attention to detail and surface texture, together with the brassy alloy of the metal and the distinctive facial features, all point to its production in a North European foundry, probably in Germany or the Netherlands.
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