Italian, mid-19th century, after Antonio Canova (1757 - 1822)

Collection of Gianni Versace Villa Fontanelle, Moltrasio;

His sale, Sotheby's London, 18 March 2009, lot 411.

Between late 1808 and early 1809, Lucien Bonaparte commissioned Canova to create an idealized portrait of his wife, Alexandrine de Bleschamp, Princess of Canino. Two plaster busts are preserved at the Museo Gypsotheca e Casa Antonio Canova in Possagno (inv. 193 and inv. 194). The sculptor subsequently adapted the model into a life-size figure of Terpsichore, one of the nine Muses, associated with dance and lyric poetry. The original plaster, signed and dated 1811, is now preserved in the Villa Carlotta, Tremezzo. A first marble version of the model was exhibited in Paris in 1813; at the time, it belonged to the distinguished collector Giovanni Battista Sommariva (Fondazione Magnani Rocca, near Parma). Canova produced a second version between 1814 and 1816 for the English collector Sir Simon Houghton Clarke. It was exhibited in London in 1817, at the Royal Academy, where it was greatly admired by visitors (Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund, inv. 1968.212).

RELATED LITERATURE

G. Pavanello, M. Praz, L'Opera completa del Canova, I Classici dell'Arte, Milan, 1976, pp. 118-119, cat. 210-212.