Vittorio Caradossi

Christie's New York, 10 October 2016, lot 135;

Private American Collection

Caradossi’s ambitious marble figures and groups are rarely related to specific mythological or historical subjects. His Leda and Swan is a fabulous exception that still allows the sculptor to interpret his theme with his inimitable sensuality and exuberance.  Leda and the Swan is amongst the most frequently depicted of Greek myths. The subject matter has been popular since the Renaissance with artists from Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci to Correggio, François Boucher and even Paul Cézanne. In Greek legend, Leda was of noble birth and great beauty. She was the daughter of Thestius, king of Aetolia and the wife of Tyndareus of Lacedaemon. Zeus, disguised as a swan, seduces Leda and from their union various accounts attribute the birth of Helen of Troy, Castor and Pollux and Clytemnestra.

Vittorio Caradossi was born in Florence and studied sculpture under Augusto Rivalta at the Accademia di Belle Arti. His genre epitomizes fin-de-siècle Tuscan sculpture. Technically superb, most of his oeuvre is dominated by highly decorative groups and single nude figures in various symbolic or allegorical guises. In works such as Tre Nereidi (Three Mermaids), Il Fumo che sale verso le Nubi (Smoke Sweeping up to the Clouds), and Shooting Stars, Caradossi was clearly catering to a strong demand from an international clientele for elaborate and sensual compositions. Sotheby's achieved the record for the sculptor with his Shooting Stars which sold at Sotheby's New York on 8 November 2013, lot 12, for $689,000 against an estimate of $300,000-500,000.

RELATED LITERATURE

A. Panzetta, Nuovo dizionario degli scultori Italiani dell'ottocento e del primo novecento, Turin, 2003, p. 200