Lot Essay
The scagliola, conceived as black marble inlaid with engraved statuary marble, celebrates 'Love's Triumph' with medallions of grape-harvesting nymphs framing a scene derived from Ovid's Metamorphoses and depicting the seduction of the Theban Princess Antiope by Zeus in the guise of a satyr. While their acanthus-wrapped cartouches are festooned with garlands held by a sphynx, satyr-masks with palm-fronds are incorporated in the spandrel-cartouches that frame festive putti with fruit and flowers; and these are accompanied by nymphs and putti emerging from the arabesque-scrolls of Roman foliage in the style of Frises, feuillages et grotesques published in the 1640s by Stefano Della Bella (d. 1664). Related table tops made by Simone Sette in the middle of the 17th Century are illsutrated D. Collec, La Scagliola carpigiana, Modena, 1992, pp. 74 and 146. Related table tops by Marco Mazelli are in the Museo Civico, Carpi (ibid. p. 146)