An Italian marble bust of Diana, by Giusto Il Corte (1627-1678), circa 1660

This fine marble bust of Diana is immediately recognizable as the work of  the Flemish born Italian sculptor Giusto Il Corte (or Juste Le Court),  who  travelled to Rome and eventually settled in Venice around 1655. He quickly became well-known and won several commissions but his most celebrated work was the decoration of the high altar of S Maria della Salute, Venice. The animation and often theatricality of his sculptures recalls the style of Gianlorenzo Bernini, whose works Il Corte would have seen on his visits to Rome. He was clearly captivated by variations in texture, which he used in his carvings to enhance the details and play of light and shade. The lively treatment seen here in Diana's hair, artfully gathered in a chignon and adorned with a plait, directly corresponds to several of  Il Corte's busts and figures including his bust of a female in Stra. villa Pisani (Guerriero, op. cit., fig. 196). He carved the hair on his bust of Christ (Guerriero, op. cit., fig. 237) in Cittadella, chiesetta di Bernardo Nave in the same manner, building up the volume with undulating curls and tresses falling on the chest, finishing in fine strands of hair. The large, almond-shaped eyes with delicately carved tear ducts and thin eye lids combined with very a classical nose are also characteristic of Il Corte's work, particularly in his mythological or allegorical figures and busts.
The broad face with full lips seen in this Diana is another distinguishing feature of his sculptures including his two signed allegories of Strength and Prudence in the monument to Alvise Mocenigo in San Lazzaro dei Mendicanti, executed between 1657 and 1665 (Bacchi, op. cit., figs. 411 and 412).

RELATED LITERATURE

A. Bacchi, Giusto Il Corte, in La sculture a Venezia a Sansovino a Canova, eds. A. Bacchi and S. Zanuso, Milan 2000
S. Guerriero, "Le alterne fortuine dei marmi: busti, teste di carattere e altre 'scolture moderne' nelle collezione veneziane tra sei e settecento," in La scultura veneta de seicento e del settecento: nuovi studi, Venice, 2002, pp. 73-149
A. Bacchi, "Le cose più belle e principali nelle chiese di Venezia sono opere sue": Giusto Le Court a Santa Maria della Salute (e altrove), in Nuovi Studi, XI, 12, 2006, pp. 145-158