BC/AD Sculpture Ancient to Modern
BC/AD Sculpture Ancient to Modern
A ROMAN MARBLE FIGURE OF EROS-HARPOCRATES, CIRCA 2ND CENTURY A.D.
Lot Closed
July 9, 01:36 PM GMT
Estimate
120,000 - 150,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
A ROMAN MARBLE FIGURE OF EROS-HARPOCRATES, CIRCA 2ND CENTURY A.D.
standing with his right leg against a tree-trunk support, holding a fluted cornucopia brimming with grapes and other fruit cradled in his left arm, and raising his right hand before him, a chlamys fastened with a brooch on his right shoulder and draped over his right forearm, his head turned to his right, his face with parted lips and broad forehead, the hair arranged in a plait across the crown and falling in long corkscrew curls over the temples and sides; part of left ankle and shin-bone, front of right lower thigh, genitalia, and lower part of cornucopia incl. right hand restored; nose and right arm incl. puntello formerly restored (the arm available upon request). ,the number 19 engraved on top of the base.
Height: 135 cm.
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Cardinal Antonio Barberini (1607-1671), Palazzo Barberini a Giubbonari, by the Campo de Fiori
Prince Maffeo Barberini Colonna di Sciarra, VII principe di Carbognano (1771-1849), Palazzo Sciarra, Rome, by inheritance in 1810/1811
Prince Maffeo II Barberini Colonna di Sciarra, VIII principe di Carbognano (1850-1925), Palazzo Sciarra, by descent [seen there by F. Matz in 1867/1870]
Stanford White, acquired in Rome in the 1890s or early 1900s
the financier Henry W. Poor (1844-1915), Gramercy Park, New York, acquired from or through the above, who designed and furnished his entire house (American Art Association, New York, Illustrated Catalogue of the Valuable Artistic Furnishings and Interior Decorations of the Residence of Henry W. Poor, Esq., No. 1 Lexington Avenue, Gramercy Park, New York City, April 21st-24th, 1909, no. 15, illus., sold $800: https://archive.org/stream/artisticfurnishi00amer#page/n14/mode/1up (displayed together in the house and sold in the auction as a single lot ["A Massive Antique Fountain"] with a Roman marble strigillated lion sarcophagus later sold separately at Sotheby's, New York, December 6th, 2012, no. 37: http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/lot.37.html/2012/antiquities-n08918)
the architect and landscape designer Charles Adam Platt (1861-1933), New York, acquired at the above sale
Harold Fowler McCormick (1872-1941) of International Harvester, and his wife Edith Rockefeller McCormick (1872-1932), the Pompeian Room at Villa Turicum, Lake Forest, Illinois, acquired from or through the above, who designed and furnished their entire house and grounds
Michael Tauber & Company, Chicago & American Art Association, Anderson Galleries, New York, Contents of the residences of the late Edith Rockefeller McCormick at 1000 Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Ill., and Villa Turicum, Lake Forest, Ill: French furniture and other furnishings, books, linens and laces, porcelains, silver and other objects; also a Rolls Royce Brougham, Sold by order of the Chicago title and trust company, executor, January 20th, 1934, no. 1002, illus., sold $375: https://archive.org/stream/unset00amer_36#page/154/mode/1up (displayed and sold together with the aforementioned sarcophagus as part of a fountain)
private collection, United Kingdom, acquired prior to 1981, in the 1970s (Bonhams, London, Antiquities, July 5th, 2018, no. 86, illus.: https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/24684/lot/86/ (sold individually and without its late 17th to early 20th century collection history)
acquired by the present owner at the above sale
DOCUMENTED
inventory of Cardinal Antonio Barberini (1607-1671) at Palazzo Barberini a Giubbonari, by the Campo de Fiori, August 17th, 1671, p. 612, no. 690: "Una figura di un putto nudo antico resturato con un Cornucopia in mano di frutti."
PUBLISHED
Friedrich Matz and Friedrich von Duhn, Antike Bildwerke in Rom, vol. 1, Leipzig, 1881, p. 81f., no. 307 (https://archive.org/details/antikebildwerkei01matz/page/80/mode/2up)
M. Aronberg Lavin, Seventeenth Century Barberini Documents and Inventories of Art, New York, 1975, p. 324, no. 690
David Lowe, Chicago Interiors: Views of a Splendid World, Chicago, 1979, p. 142, no. 73, illus.
Carlo Pietrangeli, Palazzo Sciarra, Rome, 1986, p. 368, no. 9
Related marble statues of Eros-Harpokrates holding the cornucopia show him either as a a child, as in Thessaloniki (http://arachne.uni-koeln.de/item/objekt/110086) and Rome (C. L. Visconti, I Monumenti del Museo Torlonia, no. 73, pl. 19: http://arachne.uni-koeln.de/item/buchseite/429283), or, as in the present statue, in the guise of an adolescent (see the statue from Perge in Antalya: https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Perge_-_Harpokrates.jpg ). Representations of this subject in the round are scarce in marble and very common in terracotta, bronze, silver, and gold (see “Harpocrates,” LIMC, vol. IV).
For more information on the provenance of the Eros-Harpocrates figure, see https://www.sothebys.com/en/articles/from-a-roman-palazzo-to-gramercy-park-the-many-lives-of-a-roman-statue?locale=en