Friday, February 3, 2017

More Copies of Classic Sculpture at the Hermitage

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Rome
copy of The Tiber at the Louvre
ca. 1675-1700
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

"The problems posed by the techniques of reproduction used by firms such as Brucciani and Gerber are also of great consequence. Thus it is possible that the promiscuous familiarity encouraged by these techniques may have unintentionally diminished the glamour of the statues reproduced. To Josiah Wedgwood, addressing his customers in 1779, it was self-evident that multiplying copies of ancient masterpieces would, like the printing of scientific discoveries, prevent 'the Return of Ignorant and barbarous Ages'.  Through copies, 'good Taste' would be diffused, 'the publick Eye . . . instructed' and 'all the Arts receive Improvement'.  Nor, he added, 'can there be any surer way of rendering an exquisite Piece, possessed by an Individual, famous without diminishing the Value of the Original : for the more Copies there are of any Works, as of the Venus Medicis, for instance, the more celebrated the Original will be'.  Ironically, however, it was when the Venus de' Medici was most multiplied that we can trace the first significant indications of a decline in her reputation."

 from Taste and the Antique : the Lure of Classical Sculpture 1500-1900 by Francis Haskell and Nicholas Penny (Yale, 1981)

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Rome
copy of Cupid and Psyche (or Caunus and Byblis
at the Capitoline Museum, Rome
ca. 1750-75
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Rome
copy of Cupid and Psyche (or Caunus and Byblis)
at the Capitoline Museum, Rome

ca. 1750
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Rome
copy of the Borghese Hermaphrodite at the Louvre
18th century
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Rome
copy of Marsyas at the Uffizi, Florence
ca. 1750
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Anonymous Italian sculptor working in Florence
copy of the Wrestlers at the Uffizi, Florence
ca. 1600-1625
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Pierre Legros
copy of the Wrestlers at the Uffizi, Florence
before 1717
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Francesco Righetti
copy of Centaur and Cupid at the Louvre
1787
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Giuseppe Boschi
copy of the Younger Furietti Centaur 
at the Capitoline Museum, Rome
late 18th century
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Giuseppe Boschi
copy of the Elder Furietti Centaur 
at the Capitoline Museum, Rome
late 18th century
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 
Anonymous Italian sculptor
copy of the Farnese Flora in Naples
ca. 1750
terracotta statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Anonymous Italian sculptor
copy of the Borghese Gladiator at the Louvre
ca. 1765
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Giacomo Zoffoli
copy of the Borghese Gladiator at the Louvre
before 1785
bronze statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Sèvres Porcelain Manufactory
copy of the Callipygian Venus in Naples 
ca. 1773-80
porcelain statuette
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Paolo Andrea Triscornia
copy of the Callipygian Venus in Naples
ca. 1775-1800
full-size marble
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg