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Lot Essay
This superb, and highly inventive, bronze has long been the focus of discussion both concerning the iconography and its authorship. When included in the exhibition of the Quentin Collection at The Frick Collection in 2004/2005 it was described as an ‘Allegorical Deity Seated on Grotesques’. It was only in 2008 that Anthea Brooke plausibly suggested that the scene represented is actually ‘Hercules Overcoming Nereus’. Nereus, the ‘Old Man of the Sea’ and the father of the Nereids, had the gift of prophecy as well as the ability to change forms. In the course of his Twelve Labours, Hercules sought out Nereus in order that he might help Hercules in his journey to the Garden of the Hesperides. Nereus at first declined and a battle ensued, with Nereus changing forms in his attempts to escape. Hercules eventually overcame the sea god and found the garden.
The traditional attribution of the bronze is to the great Dutch sculptor Adriaen de Vries (circa 1545-1626). However, in the Frick exhibition catalogue the co-authors – Patricia Wengraf and Manfred Leithe-Jasper – offered separate entries for the same bronze with different conclusions. Leithe-Jasper felt the evidence for a full attribution to de Vries was not strong enough, and discussed the possibility that it was a bronze cast of a model by an as-yet-unidentified goldsmith. Alternatively, Wengraf supported the traditional attribution to de Vries. She notes that the obscure iconography as well as the inventive use of grotesques were both typical of the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, for whom de Vries worked for much of his career, and she cites numerous stylistic similarities between the figure of Hercules and documented works by the sculptor. Among these, one of the most compelling is the facial similarity between the Hercules and de Vries’s figure of Neptune in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm (inv. No. Drb Sk 49). Certainly, the author of the bronze offered here had a rare, inventive artistic ability consistent with what we know of the œuvre of Adriaen de Vries.
The traditional attribution of the bronze is to the great Dutch sculptor Adriaen de Vries (circa 1545-1626). However, in the Frick exhibition catalogue the co-authors – Patricia Wengraf and Manfred Leithe-Jasper – offered separate entries for the same bronze with different conclusions. Leithe-Jasper felt the evidence for a full attribution to de Vries was not strong enough, and discussed the possibility that it was a bronze cast of a model by an as-yet-unidentified goldsmith. Alternatively, Wengraf supported the traditional attribution to de Vries. She notes that the obscure iconography as well as the inventive use of grotesques were both typical of the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, for whom de Vries worked for much of his career, and she cites numerous stylistic similarities between the figure of Hercules and documented works by the sculptor. Among these, one of the most compelling is the facial similarity between the Hercules and de Vries’s figure of Neptune in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm (inv. No. Drb Sk 49). Certainly, the author of the bronze offered here had a rare, inventive artistic ability consistent with what we know of the œuvre of Adriaen de Vries.