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Lot Essay
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE:
Maria Potzl-Malikova, Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, Vienna, Jugend und Volk, 1982.
The first head is a model of catalogue number 71, the original metal cast is in the Museum der Bildenden Kunste, Budapest (Inv. Nr.53655).
The second is a model of catalogue number 69, the original was of lead, whereabouts presently unknown.
The series of sixty-nine grimacing self portrait heads were 'discovered' posthumously in his studio, forty-nine of which were subsequently displayed in a Prague exhibition of 1793 called Merkwurdige Lebensgeschichte des Franz Xaver Messerschmidt K.K. Oeffentliche Lehrer des Bildhauerkunst.
The heads from the exhibition were of a lead and tin alloy. The plaster busts, many of which are illustrated in Maria Potzl-Malikova's catalogue, are thought to be copies from the early 19th century and later.
Franz Xaver Messerschmidt (born Wiesensteig, near Ulm, 6th February 1736, died Pressburg, 19th August 1783).
Maria Potzl-Malikova, Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, Vienna, Jugend und Volk, 1982.
The first head is a model of catalogue number 71, the original metal cast is in the Museum der Bildenden Kunste, Budapest (Inv. Nr.53655).
The second is a model of catalogue number 69, the original was of lead, whereabouts presently unknown.
The series of sixty-nine grimacing self portrait heads were 'discovered' posthumously in his studio, forty-nine of which were subsequently displayed in a Prague exhibition of 1793 called Merkwurdige Lebensgeschichte des Franz Xaver Messerschmidt K.K. Oeffentliche Lehrer des Bildhauerkunst.
The heads from the exhibition were of a lead and tin alloy. The plaster busts, many of which are illustrated in Maria Potzl-Malikova's catalogue, are thought to be copies from the early 19th century and later.
Franz Xaver Messerschmidt (born Wiesensteig, near Ulm, 6th February 1736, died Pressburg, 19th August 1783).