A German brass figure of a putto, the cast attributed to Magnus Karsten (active 1565-1574), circa 1566, possibly Goslar

L. Camins, Renaissance and Baroque Bronzes from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection (exh. cat.), M.H. de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco, 1988, pp. 144-145, cat. no. 51
C. Avery, Sculture: Bronzetti, Placchette, Medaglie, Museo Civico Amedeo Lia, La Spezia, 1998, p. 194
M. H. Schwartz (ed.), European Sculpture from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection, New York, 2008, no. 68, p. 134

Once part of a candleholder, this figure derives loosely from a wood figure by Pancraz Labenwolf (Bange, op. cit., p. 100) and is known in other examples including one in the Kunstgewerbemuseum, Berlin.  It has been attributed to the bronze caster Magnus Karsten based upon similarity to figures on a baptisimal font in the Marktkirche, Goslar.  The stocky proportions, rustic treatment of details, facial features, and integral hill-shaped base are found also in a similar figure in the Museo Civico Amadeo Lia, La Spezia (Avery, op. cit., no. 120) and a figure of Venus in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1982.60.120).

RELATED LITERATURE

E.F. Bange, Die Deutchen Bronzestatuetten des 16. Jahrhunderts, Berlin, 1949