ATTRIBUTED TO MASSIMILIANO SOLDANI BENZI (1656-1740), ITALIAN, FLORENCE, FIRST HALF 18TH CENTURY, AFTER THE ANTIQUE | VENUS DE' MEDICI

This beautiful bronze Venus de' Medici is very close to another bronze of the same subject which is given to the celebrated Florentine sculptor Massimiliano Soldani Benzi and is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (ex Ogden Mills collection; inv. no. 27.36.8). Soldani was responsible for casting a series of fine small scale bronzes (all circa 30cm high) of the most famous ancient and renaissance sculptural models. Alongside the Dancing Faun and and Sansovino's Bacchus (amongst others), the Venus de' Medici was one of the models selected by the sculptor, whose small scale statuettes are recorded in the Doccia porcelain inventories, including: 'No. 17 La Venere de Medici. Con sue forme' (published by Lankheit, 1982, op. cit., p. 157). The present bronze is a particularly fine cast: note the beautifully chased lips and eyes. Soldani cast a lifesize version of the Venus de' Medici in 1695 for Prince Johann Adam Adreas I von Liechtenstein which is still in the Liechtenstein collection (inv. no. SK537).

RELATED LITERATURE

K. Lankheit, Florentinische Barockplastik: Die Kunst am Hofe der letzten Medici 1670-1743, Munich, 1962, p. 157, figs. 13-20; C. Avery, 'Soldani's Small Bronze Statuettes after 'Old Masters' Sculptures in Florence,' K. Lankheit, Kunst des Barock in der Toskana. Studien zur Kunst unter den letzten Medici, Munich, 1976, pp. 165-172