A LOUIS XIV BRONZE FIGURE OF DIANA

LATE 17TH/EARLY 18TH CENTURY, CAST FROM A MODEL BY ANSELME FLAMEN (1647-1717)

Details

A LOUIS XIV BRONZE FIGURE OF DIANA
Late 17th/Early 18th century, Cast from a model by Anselme Flamen (1647-1717)
Diana gazes down and carresses the greyhound at her side, she holds a bow in her left hand, above an integrally cast base
28in. (71cm.) high

Provenance

George Durlacher, Esq. sold Christie's London, 6 April 1938, lot 51
The Marquis de Gouy d'Arcy
Anonymous sale, Christie's London, 6 July 1993, lot 127

Literature

New York, M. Knoedler & Co., The French Bronze 1500-1800, 6-27 November 1968, no. 18, illustrated
F. Souchal, French Sculptors of the 17th and 18th centuries, The Reign of Louis XIV, Oxford, 1977, A-F, pp. 285-6, figs. 32, i-32, iii A. Gibbon, Bronzes Franais du Grand Sicle, Paris, 1985, p. 47, figs. 55-6

Lot Essay

The present bronze has been variously attributed to the circle of Francesco Primaticcio and Germain Pilon. Franois Souchal first recognized its close connection to Anselme Flamen's marble statue of Diana of 1693, designed for one of the fountains in the park at Marly and now in the Louvre. The bronze presumably depends from a model in wax or terracotta from the marble, and differs from it in various minor respects. A preparatory drawing in Berlin shows what must be a still earlier conception, in which the goddess held aloft an arrow, as opposed to her bow, and a wild boar's head nestled at her feet alongside the hound. The subject of Diane Chasseresse was already a favorite one in the previous century among the artists of the school of Fontainebleau, as is demonstrated by two memorable representations in the Louvre, both of them anonymous. One is a full-length painting, the other the sculpture known as the Diane d'Anet.

The present bronze is known in at least two other casts, one formerly in the Charleston Museum, South Carolina, the other last recorded in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow, and previously in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg.