Beschreibung:

AN IMPRESSIVE FULL-SIZE PLASTER SECTION OF DONATELLO'S EQUESTRIAN STATUE OF GATTAMELATA LATE 19TH / EARLY 20TH CENTURY Showing the rider's right leg, clad in armour, and partial ornate saddle 144cm high, 85cm wide Provenance: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Acquired Sotheby's New York, 28 February 2006, Historic Plaster Casts from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, lot 124 (with tag) Catalogue note: In 1444, Donatello was commissioned to sculpt a large bronze equestrian group of the condottiero Erasmo da Narni ("Gattamelata", which means "honeyed cat"), who had served various city states during his military career. The piece, finished in 1453, currently sits in the Piazza del Santo in Padua, where Gattamelata had been 'podesta', or chief magistrate. The horse and rider, inspired by the Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome and the Greek horses atop the Venetian Church of St Mark's, remain some of the Italian Renaissance's most iconic works of sculpture, and would provide a source of inspiration for Renaissance and later equestrian monuments. Condition Report: Marks, knocks and scuffs overall consistent with age. The leg has been repaired. There is cracking to the saddle in various places including a large vertical crack to the upper moulding, and a horizontal crack to the rear part of the tasselled border. Possible repair to putto's protruding elbow. Further minor areas of surface flaking. This lot is fragmentary and may be fragile to handle. It is currently hanging from a large chain, and the rear (as far as visible) looks hollow and is irregularly modelled. Condition Report Disclaimer