Lot Essay
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE:
A. Storelli, Jean-Baptiste Nini, Sa Vie - son oeuvre, 1717-1786, Tours, 1896, p. 85, no. XLII
S. Lami, Dictionnaire des Sculpteurs de l'cole Franaise au dix-huitieme Sicle, Paris, 1911, vol. 2, p. 90
L. Forrer, Biographical Dictionary of Medallists, London, 1909, p. 273
J. D. Draper, 'French Terracottas', in The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, Winter, 1991/92, p. 15
This is arguable the finest of Nini's four variant portraits of Louis XV (Storelli, no. XXXVIII-XLI). The stops between the words of the inscription are in the form of fleur-de-lys, the French national emblem, one of which falls directly above the laurel wreath on the king's head. The Metropolitan Museum possesses a good example (52.189.10: Draper op.cit). The present one is equally fine.
A. Storelli, Jean-Baptiste Nini, Sa Vie - son oeuvre, 1717-1786, Tours, 1896, p. 85, no. XLII
S. Lami, Dictionnaire des Sculpteurs de l'cole Franaise au dix-huitieme Sicle, Paris, 1911, vol. 2, p. 90
L. Forrer, Biographical Dictionary of Medallists, London, 1909, p. 273
J. D. Draper, 'French Terracottas', in The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, Winter, 1991/92, p. 15
This is arguable the finest of Nini's four variant portraits of Louis XV (Storelli, no. XXXVIII-XLI). The stops between the words of the inscription are in the form of fleur-de-lys, the French national emblem, one of which falls directly above the laurel wreath on the king's head. The Metropolitan Museum possesses a good example (52.189.10: Draper op.cit). The present one is equally fine.