AFTER ANTONIO CANOVA, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

The present casts are two representations of the original three marble sculptures by Canova, 'Dancer With Hands on Hips', 'Dancer With Finger Touching Her Chin', and 'Dancer With Cymbals', executed between 1805 and 1814. Fred Licht states in his book Canova, Abbeville Press 1983. ..Canova had already prepared the way with earlier experiments: The Dance of the Sons of Alcinous (plate 258) and Hebe (plate 162). Although these three dancers do not have any of the conventional attributes of divinities or mythological figures, they can be included among the mythologies because Canova himself variously referred to the first among them (plate 192) as Muse of the Dance, Nymph of the Dance, or Erato, Muse of Amorous Dancing. All three also pertain to the contemporaneous fashion of "tableaux vivants." Emma Hamiltons' curious performances are only the most widely known example of the kind of attitudinizing, half-dance, half-charade, that was immensely polular in Canova's day. For further comparative literature see Giuseppe Pavanello, L'opera completa del Canova, Rizzoli Editore, Milano. Ref.172-3.