Andiron with Figure of Venus

c. 1600/1675

Venetian 17th Century, partly after a model by Tiziano Aspetti

Associated Names
Venetian 17th Century

Artist

Tiziano Aspetti

Artist, Italian, 1557/1559 - 1606

This tall, dark metal sculpture consists of a nude woman standing atop an elaborate, tiered base crowded with human faces, seated people, animal forms, and scrolling ornament. The woman stands with one leg slightly bent and her head turned to our right. Her hair is gathered up, and drapery hangs from her raised left hand and falls behind her shoulder and opposite arm. A twisting, branch-like support rises behind her legs. Directly below her, two partially draped, curly-haired people sit facing one another beneath a projecting ledge decorated with a central face and curling forms. The broader section below is densely ornamented with additional faces, floral motifs, and animal heads projecting from either side. At the bottom, four large reclining animal forms, perhaps dogs or other creatures, spread outward to create the sculpture's wide base. Their bodies are covered with rounded protrusions and textured details, and shaggy heads extend toward the corners. Smaller human-like forms and garlands fill the spaces between them. The dark surface varies from nearly black in recessed areas to lighter bronze-gray highlights on projecting forms. The sculpture is photographed against a plain light gray background.

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery M24

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    bronze

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 103.4 x 56.3 x 40.2 cm (40 11/16 x 22 3/16 x 15 13/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1961.9.101

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Baron Adolphe de Rothschild [1823-1900], Paris; Baron Maurice de Rothschild [d. 1957], Paris; Clarence H. Mackay [1874-1938], Roslyn, New York by 1925;[1] (Jacques Seligmann & Cie., New York); purchased 1948, probably through (French & Co., New York),[2] by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York; gift 1961 to NGA.

[1] Published by Valentiner in 1925 and 1926 as in the Mackay collection and as having come from the Rothschild collection.

[2] After Mackay's death his collection was dispersed by Seligmann; records from the Kress Foundation, now in NGA curatorial files, indicate that French and Co. was involved in the 1948 acquisition.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1958

  • Decorative Arts of the Italian Renaissance 1400-1600, The Detroit Institute of Arts, 1958-1959, no. 262.

1961

  • Exhibition of Art Treasures for America from the Samuel H. Kress Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1961-1962, no. 121, as by Jacopo Sansovino.

1994

  • Fanciful Flourishes: Ornament in European Graphic Art and Related Objects, 1300-1800, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1994, brochure, no. 1.

Bibliography

1925

  • Valentiner, Wilhelm R. "The Clarence H. Mackay Collection." Art in America 13, no. 9 (1925): 320, as by Sansovino.

1926

  • Valentiner, W.R. The Clarence H. Mackay Collection. New York, 1926: 15, no. 28, as by Sansovino, repro.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 171, as by Jacopo Sansovino.

  • Pope-Hennessy, John W. Renaissance Bronzes from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Reliefs, Plaquettes, Statuettes, Utensils and Mortars. London, 1965: 125-126, no. 465, repro. fig. 570.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 150, repro., as by Jacopo Sansovino.

1970

  • The Frick Collection: An Illustrated Catalogue: III: Sculpture, Italian. Princeton, 1970: 183-184 (entry by John Pope-Hennessy, assited by Anthony Radcliff).

1983

  • Wilson, Carolyn C. Renaissance Small Bronze Sculpture and Associated Decorative Arts at the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1983: 139.

1992

  • Penny, Nicholas. Catalogue of European Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum: 1540 to the Present Day 3 vols. Oxford, 1992: I (Italian): 312.

1994

  • Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1994: 41, repro.

2001

  • Kryza-Gersch, Claudia. "Original Ideas and Their Reproduction in Venetian Foundries: Tiziano Aspetti's Mars in the Frick Collection - A Case Study." In Small Bronzes in the Renaissance. Debra Pincus, ed. Studies in the History of Art 62, Symposium Papers 39 (2001): 156 n. 25, 156-157 n. 33.

  • Kryza-Gersch, Claudia. "Tiziano Aspetti, Venere e Cupido dormiente." In Augusti, Adriana, et al, eds. Donatello e il suo tempo: il bronzetto a Padova nel Quattrocento e nel Cinquecento. Exh. cat. Musei Civici, Padua, 2001: 351.

2003

  • Krahn, Volker. Bronzetti Veneziani. Die venezianischen Kleinbronze der Renaissance aus dem Bode-Museum Berlin. Berlin, 2003:154.

2008

  • Penny, Nicholas. "The Evolution of the Plinth, Pedestal, and Socle." In Collecting Sculpture in Early Modern Europe. Nicholas Penny and Eike D. Schmidt, eds. Studies in the History of Art 70, Symposium Papers 47 (2008): 466, 467 fig. 11.

Wikidata ID

Q63854438

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