
Cameo with Night, after Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844)
Lot Closed
July 2, 03:08 PM GMT
Estimate
3,000 - 5,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
Possibly Luigi Saulini
1819 - 1883
Italian, Rome, 19th century
Cameo with Night, after Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844)
the mount stamped: 14K
agate, in a brooch mount
cameo: 34mm., 1 3/8 in.
45mm., 1 3/4 in. overall
Thorvaldsen created his models for the iconic reliefs of Night and its pendant Day after a sleepless night in the summer of 1815 in Rome. Inspired by insomnia, the sculptor conceived the personification of Night in the form of a winged woman in drowsy flight, her head tipped forwards in sleep and garlanded with poppies symbolizing opium-induced torpor. Night gently cradles two putti in her arms, who each fall lazily against her breast; an owl, the symbol of night, flies toward the viewer. Day takes the form of a young woman, who, awake, scatters roses before her and turns to look back, where a putto upholds a torch symbolizing the dawn. Both figures are clad in clinging, classically-styled drapery and float effortlessly with an ethereal quality, their delicately carved wings supporting them.
The present cameo compares with the work of Luigi Saulini, who adapted models by contemporary Neoclassical artists active in Rome, from John Gibson to Heinrich Karl Anton Mücke. Compare the cameo with Angels Bearing the Body of Saint Catherine to Mount Sinai after Mücke in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (inv. no. 40.20.56). Interestingly, Luigi's father, Tomasso Saulini (1793-1864), trained under Thorvaldsen and executed a cameo version of the Night; see M. Dickmann de Petra, and F. Barberini, Tommaso e Luigi Saulini, Incisori di cammei nella Roma dell'Ottocento, Rome, 2006, p.79, ill. 14C.
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