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Lot Essay
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE:
F. Scholten, ed., Willem van Tetrode, Sculptor (c. 1525-1580), exhibition catalogue, Zwolle, 2003, p. 39.
This intriguing bronze appears -- like so much of Baroque sculpture -- to be an amalgam of Northern and Southern sensibilities and manufacture. The bronze has been attributed to both Willem van Tetrode (c. 1525-1580) or another Flemish sculptor working in the first years of the 17th century.
Tetrode's wildly original bronzes were certainly mostly his own marvelous creations -- but they were also partly a result of his exposure to some of the most celebrated artists of his day who were working for sophisticated collectors in both the North and in Italy. This included time spent in Benvenuto Cellini's Paris and Florentine workshops and Guglielmo della Porta's Roman studio. In relating the present bronze to the work of Tetrode, the early bronzes, those produced in Rome and before he left Pittigliano in 1560 are probably closest. Tetrode was commissioned by Niccolò Orsini, Count of Pittigliano, to provide copies of classical sculpture for the Pittigliano cabinet and, as Scholten mentions, these may have been his first completely independent sculptures (Scholten, op. cit., p. 21). And the Salander Silenus, does indeed display many of these early characteristics such as the extremely uneven thickness of the casting, the flaws and holes in the surface and the characteristically square nails Tetrode used so lavishly as Binnebeke has observed. The general heaviness of the flesh in the body and face of the Salander Silenus also recalls elements of Tetrode's figures. The Tetrode Mercury, in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, also shares the rough surfaces and blackish patination of the present bronze. Many of these casting problems were obviously later solved -- so these earlier bronzes stand in marked contrast to the gorgeously modeled bronzes with their glistening surfaces produced during Tetrode's later years when he was back in Delft and Cologne.
While many of the links to Tetrode are tantalizingly, there is no documentation to confirm an attribution. And, indeed, the present bronze may only reflect some of Tetrode's brilliant influence on a slightly later follower working in the North.
Christie's would like to thank Dr. Emile van Binnebeke, of the Koninklijke Musea voor Kunst en Geschiedenis, Brussels, and Dr. Frits Scholten, Senior Curator of Sculpture, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam for generously sharing their thoughts on this bronze.
F. Scholten, ed., Willem van Tetrode, Sculptor (c. 1525-1580), exhibition catalogue, Zwolle, 2003, p. 39.
This intriguing bronze appears -- like so much of Baroque sculpture -- to be an amalgam of Northern and Southern sensibilities and manufacture. The bronze has been attributed to both Willem van Tetrode (c. 1525-1580) or another Flemish sculptor working in the first years of the 17th century.
Tetrode's wildly original bronzes were certainly mostly his own marvelous creations -- but they were also partly a result of his exposure to some of the most celebrated artists of his day who were working for sophisticated collectors in both the North and in Italy. This included time spent in Benvenuto Cellini's Paris and Florentine workshops and Guglielmo della Porta's Roman studio. In relating the present bronze to the work of Tetrode, the early bronzes, those produced in Rome and before he left Pittigliano in 1560 are probably closest. Tetrode was commissioned by Niccolò Orsini, Count of Pittigliano, to provide copies of classical sculpture for the Pittigliano cabinet and, as Scholten mentions, these may have been his first completely independent sculptures (Scholten, op. cit., p. 21). And the Salander Silenus, does indeed display many of these early characteristics such as the extremely uneven thickness of the casting, the flaws and holes in the surface and the characteristically square nails Tetrode used so lavishly as Binnebeke has observed. The general heaviness of the flesh in the body and face of the Salander Silenus also recalls elements of Tetrode's figures. The Tetrode Mercury, in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, also shares the rough surfaces and blackish patination of the present bronze. Many of these casting problems were obviously later solved -- so these earlier bronzes stand in marked contrast to the gorgeously modeled bronzes with their glistening surfaces produced during Tetrode's later years when he was back in Delft and Cologne.
While many of the links to Tetrode are tantalizingly, there is no documentation to confirm an attribution. And, indeed, the present bronze may only reflect some of Tetrode's brilliant influence on a slightly later follower working in the North.
Christie's would like to thank Dr. Emile van Binnebeke, of the Koninklijke Musea voor Kunst en Geschiedenis, Brussels, and Dr. Frits Scholten, Senior Curator of Sculpture, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam for generously sharing their thoughts on this bronze.