Lot Essay
DOCUMENTS:
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Rel. Soppr. 51, Certosa di S. Lorenzo, 87, p. 425 verso
,,m.ro Giovanni bologna schultore L cinquanta di m.ta porto Antonio suo huomo contanti a buon conto delle fiure che si debbe fare di bronzo per il nostro ciborio
Et a di 27 d'Aprile 1596 L cinquanta di m.ta per lui a m.ro Antonio susini scultore pagato contanti fino a di 19 detto a detto
Et a di 27 di luglio (1596) L centoquindici di m.ta per lui al detto porto contanti per resto di XI fiure di bronzo fatte per il nostro ciborio..."
These two angels belong to a series of six that formerly decorated the hexagonal marble tabernacle of the Holy Sacrament behind the high altar of the Certosa of Galluzzo, just south of Florence. The only other known example now in the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, is similarly posed to, but differently draped from, the present angel with its right arm raised.
Statuettes of the four Evangelists and of the Risen Christ completed the sculptural decoration, the latter being in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, along with two of the Evangelists, while another Evangelist is in the Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, and the fourth is missing. A duplicate set of all four Evangelists from the ancestral collections of the Dukes of Braunschweig-Wofenbüttel is in the Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum, Braunschweig, Germany (see Avery, op.cit. 1987, p. 265, cat. nos. 101-5).
ÿ
The Risen Christ and four Evangelists were all with the Munich dealer Julius Böhler before Keutner published them in 1955. The present two angels were known from photographs to have been in the Berlin art trade in the 1920s. All were similarly mounted on cylindrical pedestals of porphyry, which suggests that after their removal by Napoleonic troops early in the 19th century, they eventually found their way into a German collection, perhaps a noble one, from which they were then dispersed after the First World War.
The series of statuettes is exactly documented in the Florentine State Archive, as above, to the year 1596. Payments of April and July indicate that Giambologna was paid via his foundryman Antonio Susini a total, apparently of 215 lire in cash. Nearly a century later, Giambologna's biographer Baldinucci, ususally very well informed, noted that around 1600 Giambologna had to make a marble ciborium, with bronze statuettes of the four Evangelists and six angels, which he handed over to Susini to make, and the latter made them from his own models, except for one Evangelist, for which he used his master's model for the statue of St. Luke on Orsanmichele. Baldinucci did not specify the location of the tabernacle, and overlooked the crowning statuette of the Risen Christ, which is also based on a model by Giambologna, for his life-size marble Christ on the Altar of Liberty in San Martino, Lucca.
Furthermore, and directly relevant to the present bronzes, the angel with its left arm raised is closely derived from the monumental example that crowns the pediment of the altar in the Salviati Chapel in San Marco, Florence, of c. 1581-87 (Avery, op.cit. 1987, pl. 224). Even so, distinct differences in the drapery, position of the wings etc., on the present statuette make it possible to accept Baldinucci's distinction of authorship, and to accept that Susini was responsible for the minor variations on Giambologna's pre-existing model.
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Rel. Soppr. 51, Certosa di S. Lorenzo, 87, p. 425 verso
,,m.ro Giovanni bologna schultore L cinquanta di m.ta porto Antonio suo huomo contanti a buon conto delle fiure che si debbe fare di bronzo per il nostro ciborio
Et a di 27 d'Aprile 1596 L cinquanta di m.ta per lui a m.ro Antonio susini scultore pagato contanti fino a di 19 detto a detto
Et a di 27 di luglio (1596) L centoquindici di m.ta per lui al detto porto contanti per resto di XI fiure di bronzo fatte per il nostro ciborio..."
These two angels belong to a series of six that formerly decorated the hexagonal marble tabernacle of the Holy Sacrament behind the high altar of the Certosa of Galluzzo, just south of Florence. The only other known example now in the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, is similarly posed to, but differently draped from, the present angel with its right arm raised.
Statuettes of the four Evangelists and of the Risen Christ completed the sculptural decoration, the latter being in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, along with two of the Evangelists, while another Evangelist is in the Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, and the fourth is missing. A duplicate set of all four Evangelists from the ancestral collections of the Dukes of Braunschweig-Wofenbüttel is in the Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum, Braunschweig, Germany (see Avery, op.cit. 1987, p. 265, cat. nos. 101-5).
ÿ
The Risen Christ and four Evangelists were all with the Munich dealer Julius Böhler before Keutner published them in 1955. The present two angels were known from photographs to have been in the Berlin art trade in the 1920s. All were similarly mounted on cylindrical pedestals of porphyry, which suggests that after their removal by Napoleonic troops early in the 19th century, they eventually found their way into a German collection, perhaps a noble one, from which they were then dispersed after the First World War.
The series of statuettes is exactly documented in the Florentine State Archive, as above, to the year 1596. Payments of April and July indicate that Giambologna was paid via his foundryman Antonio Susini a total, apparently of 215 lire in cash. Nearly a century later, Giambologna's biographer Baldinucci, ususally very well informed, noted that around 1600 Giambologna had to make a marble ciborium, with bronze statuettes of the four Evangelists and six angels, which he handed over to Susini to make, and the latter made them from his own models, except for one Evangelist, for which he used his master's model for the statue of St. Luke on Orsanmichele. Baldinucci did not specify the location of the tabernacle, and overlooked the crowning statuette of the Risen Christ, which is also based on a model by Giambologna, for his life-size marble Christ on the Altar of Liberty in San Martino, Lucca.
Furthermore, and directly relevant to the present bronzes, the angel with its left arm raised is closely derived from the monumental example that crowns the pediment of the altar in the Salviati Chapel in San Marco, Florence, of c. 1581-87 (Avery, op.cit. 1987, pl. 224). Even so, distinct differences in the drapery, position of the wings etc., on the present statuette make it possible to accept Baldinucci's distinction of authorship, and to accept that Susini was responsible for the minor variations on Giambologna's pre-existing model.