HOLME CARDWELL, AFTER THE ANTIQUE | VENUS REMOVING HER SANDAL

The motif of Venus, or Aphrodite, untying her sandal, developed from a Greek original from the Hellenistic period. Several antique interpretations are known, such as a small bronze, probably from Syria, in the Louvre Museum (inv. no. Br 4417) and a marble statuette in the British Museum (inv. no. 2000,0522.1). Sculptors in the age of Neoclassicism also took up the theme, particularly in the mid-19th century, and several versions of the present model are known from different sculptors, including Ivan Petrovich Vitali (1852) and Johann Ludwig von Hofer (1856). 

Holme Cardwell has imbued the present marble with his skillful Neoclassicism. Compare in particular the face, and the discarded sandal, to his monumental Diana, sold in these rooms, 13 December 2017 (£357,000). Holme Cardwell was a Manchester native, but spent much of his working life in Rome, where he was part of an active milieu of British expatriate artists. 

RELATED LITERATURE

I. Roscoe, E. Hardy and M. G. Sullivan, A Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors in Britain, 1660-1851, London, 2009, p. 194; 'Holme Cardwell', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/person.php?id=msib2_1202169359, accessed 05 June 2019]