Attributed to Francesco Righetti (1749 - 1815)
Attributed to Francesco Righetti (1749 - 1815)
After Luigi Valadier (1726 - 1785)
Italian, Rome, circa 1794
Écorché Horse
bronze, dark brown patina; on a verde antico marble socle
bronze: 23 by 22.5cm., 9 by 8⅞in.
34cm., 13⅜in. high overall
Catalogue Note:
The present Écorché Horse is a reduction of the Cavallo Mattei, a half-life-size bronze (90.5cm. high) now held at the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, whose pose derives from the Marcus Aurelius on the Capitoline Hill in Rome. Probably executed around 1598, as evidenced by an engraving by Carlo Ruini (fig. 1), it has been regarded by some scholars as a study by Giambologna for his equestrian statue of Cosimo I de’ Medici (circa 1594; Piazza della Signoria, Florence).
In 1703, the Cavallo is documented in Rome, at the villa of Duke Giuseppe Mattei, from whom it takes its name. It subsequently entered the collection of Cardinal Fesch, Napoleon I’s uncle, and was included in his sale in Paris on 17 June 1816 (lot 263). It reappeared in London in 1913, where it was acquired by the American art historian Charles Loeser (1864–1928), who, upon his death, bequeathed it, together with part of his collection, to the city of Florence. Three further casts of the same size were produced by Luigi Valadier and his son Giuseppe between the late 18th and early 19th centuries. One, from the Torrie collection and formerly owned by Sir James Erskine, is now at the University of Edinburgh; another is held at the Museum of Fine Arts in Springfield, Massachusetts; and the third, formerly in the collections of the Dukes of Northumberland and subsequently owned by Baron Alexis de Redé (1922–2000) at the Hôtel Lambert, was sold by Sotheby’s in Monaco on 26 May 1975 (lot 187), and later by Christie’s in London on 4 July 2013 (lot 10).
In 1794, Francesco Righetti, the celebrated Roman sculptor, goldsmith and bronze founder, who had trained under Luigi Valadier, published a sales catalogue of the bronze reductions produced in his workshop after some of the most renowned models of Antiquity and the Modern Era. Among the bronzes offered was “a flayed horse by Mattei, 20 Roman sequins”, a model that Righetti had undoubtedly had the opportunity to study during his time in Valadier’s workshop.
Renowned for the quality of their casting and the perfection of their chasing, Righetti’s bronzes were particularly sought after by an international collector visiting Rome, an essential stop on the Grand Tour, from the 1780s onwards. Buoyed by his success, he opened a second workshop in Naples in the early 19th century. The precision of the present Écorché Horse, which renders in the finest detail an equine musculature observed with exceptional accuracy, and its rich brown patina, which accentuates the forms, are consistent with Righetti’s autograph bronzes and support its attribution to this master bronze founder.
We are deeply grateful to Dr Jeremy Warren for taking the time to examine the present bronze and for his invaluable assistance with the research and preparation of this catalogue entry.
RELATED LITERATURE
A. Gonzàles-Palacios, Luigi Valadier. Frick collection, New York, 2018, p. 388 and 478;
J. Winter, Valadier. Three Generations of Roman Goldsmiths. exh. cat. London, 1991, p. 148-152, no 77;
F. Haskell, N. Penny, Pour l'Amour de l'Antique, Paris, London, 1988, p. 370;
Robinson, 'Springfield's Anatomical Horse of Bronze', Bulletin Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, Massachusetts, October/November 1969;
H. Weihrauch, Europaïsche Bronzestatuetten 15. - 18. Jahrhundert, Brunswick, 1967, p. 435, fig. 518;
L. Principi, “Una anotomia cavallesca: Van der Schardt, sculptor in bronze between Bologna and Mantua”, dans Simiolus, 2019, vol. 41, no 3, pp. 191-208.
Provenance:
Private collection, Paris, since the 1960s;
Thence by descent to the present owners.
Literature:
A. Radcliffe, Giambologna. Ein Wendepunkt der Europäischen Plastik, Vienna, Edinburgh, 1978, p. 252, no. 169;
G. S. Salmann, “An attempt at analysis”, in The Connoisseur, January 1969, pp. 19-23.
Attributed to Francesco Righetti (1749 - 1815)
After Luigi Valadier (1726 - 1785)
Italian, Rome, circa 1794
Écorché Horse
bronze, dark brown patina; on a verde antico marble socle
bronze: 23 by 22.5cm., 9 by 8⅞in.
34cm., 13⅜in. high overall
Catalogue Note:
The present Écorché Horse is a reduction of the Cavallo Mattei, a half-life-size bronze (90.5cm. high) now held at the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, whose pose derives from the Marcus Aurelius on the Capitoline Hill in Rome. Probably executed around 1598, as evidenced by an engraving by Carlo Ruini (fig. 1), it has been regarded by some scholars as a study by Giambologna for his equestrian statue of Cosimo I de’ Medici (circa 1594; Piazza della Signoria, Florence).
In 1703, the Cavallo is documented in Rome, at the villa of Duke Giuseppe Mattei, from whom it takes its name. It subsequently entered the collection of Cardinal Fesch, Napoleon I’s uncle, and was included in his sale in Paris on 17 June 1816 (lot 263). It reappeared in London in 1913, where it was acquired by the American art historian Charles Loeser (1864–1928), who, upon his death, bequeathed it, together with part of his collection, to the city of Florence. Three further casts of the same size were produced by Luigi Valadier and his son Giuseppe between the late 18th and early 19th centuries. One, from the Torrie collection and formerly owned by Sir James Erskine, is now at the University of Edinburgh; another is held at the Museum of Fine Arts in Springfield, Massachusetts; and the third, formerly in the collections of the Dukes of Northumberland and subsequently owned by Baron Alexis de Redé (1922–2000) at the Hôtel Lambert, was sold by Sotheby’s in Monaco on 26 May 1975 (lot 187), and later by Christie’s in London on 4 July 2013 (lot 10).
In 1794, Francesco Righetti, the celebrated Roman sculptor, goldsmith and bronze founder, who had trained under Luigi Valadier, published a sales catalogue of the bronze reductions produced in his workshop after some of the most renowned models of Antiquity and the Modern Era. Among the bronzes offered was “a flayed horse by Mattei, 20 Roman sequins”, a model that Righetti had undoubtedly had the opportunity to study during his time in Valadier’s workshop.
Renowned for the quality of their casting and the perfection of their chasing, Righetti’s bronzes were particularly sought after by an international collector visiting Rome, an essential stop on the Grand Tour, from the 1780s onwards. Buoyed by his success, he opened a second workshop in Naples in the early 19th century. The precision of the present Écorché Horse, which renders in the finest detail an equine musculature observed with exceptional accuracy, and its rich brown patina, which accentuates the forms, are consistent with Righetti’s autograph bronzes and support its attribution to this master bronze founder.
We are deeply grateful to Dr Jeremy Warren for taking the time to examine the present bronze and for his invaluable assistance with the research and preparation of this catalogue entry.
RELATED LITERATURE
A. Gonzàles-Palacios, Luigi Valadier. Frick collection, New York, 2018, p. 388 and 478;
J. Winter, Valadier. Three Generations of Roman Goldsmiths. exh. cat. London, 1991, p. 148-152, no 77;
F. Haskell, N. Penny, Pour l'Amour de l'Antique, Paris, London, 1988, p. 370;
Robinson, 'Springfield's Anatomical Horse of Bronze', Bulletin Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, Massachusetts, October/November 1969;
H. Weihrauch, Europaïsche Bronzestatuetten 15. - 18. Jahrhundert, Brunswick, 1967, p. 435, fig. 518;
L. Principi, “Una anotomia cavallesca: Van der Schardt, sculptor in bronze between Bologna and Mantua”, dans Simiolus, 2019, vol. 41, no 3, pp. 191-208.
Provenance:
Private collection, Paris, since the 1960s;
Thence by descent to the present owners.
Literature:
A. Radcliffe, Giambologna. Ein Wendepunkt der Europäischen Plastik, Vienna, Edinburgh, 1978, p. 252, no. 169;
G. S. Salmann, “An attempt at analysis”, in The Connoisseur, January 1969, pp. 19-23.
