AFTER GIAMBOLOGNA, 17TH OR EARLY 18TH CENTURY

Giambologna's earliest documented model of Mars can be found in a 1587 inventory of Christian I, Elector of Saxony. While this model represented Mars with a scabbard in the right hand and nothing in the left, subsequent models varied the theme by including a severed head in the left hand - a variation that neither Giambologna nor his workshop are known to have conceived. Radcliffe suggests that due to a lack of models that prove otherwise, the earliest attributable example of this type is no earlier than Soldani's 18th century model of an Executioner with the head of St. John the Baptist, an example of which is in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin (Avery, loc. cit.). Although the present lot is compositionally the same, it varies significantly in size (taller by 1.3 cm.), finishing and detailing from Soldani's version of the subject. Interestingly, it is of exactly the same height and with similar modelling to the principle autograph version of Mars featured in Avery (loc. cit., no. 42). Although, it is unlikely that the present bronze was cast within Giambologna's lifetime, it is possible that both the present bronze and the Giambologna example came from the same mould, with the former being modified by another artist and at a later date.