Allegorical Figure Holding a Medal with the Portrait of Innocent XI

Object belonging

One's own

Category

Terracotta sculpture

City

Rome

Location

Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia

Specific location

Room 22

Inventory

PV 10656

Material and technique

Terracotta / patina

Author

Pierre Le Gros, the Younger (1666-1719)

Dating

1697

Dimensions

55.5 x 42 x 31 cm.

Origin

Pollak Collection; Torlonia Collection (last quarter of 19th century); Gorga Collection (1948); Export Office (1960)

Image copyright

SSPSAE e per il Polo Museale della città di Roma

Short description

This maquette depicts an allegorical figure that can be possibly identified as Faith, seated on a tall pedestal and, with the help of an angel, holding up a medal, on which the profile of Pope Innocent XI (1676-1689) can be made out. Two putti, unsteadily balanced on the edge of the base, are holding a large book open and seem almost to be fighting over it; both the figures are unfortunately headless and are missing other limbs, while the main figure has lost its right hand and the upper part of its head. Despite these losses, the face of Faith can be seen to be rendered with great delicacy while the large cloak that covers her is finished with vibrancy and is strongly carved in parts, with the edges of the folds almost sharp in some places. The work has a rather long and complex history, and even its attribution to Pierre Le Gros, though widely shared, has not been verified through documentary material. In 1923, Brinckmann published it for the first time, recognizing the depiction of Innocent XI on the medal, yet judging it an ill-suited form of representation for a papal portrait, and preferring to liken the terracotta to the figure of Faith in the Monument to Lelio Falconieri, executed by Ferrata before 1669 for the church of San Giovanni dei Fiorentini. In 1960, Brugnoli compared the work to the monument to Innocent XI in the Vatican and attributed the terracotta to Monnot. It was Ursula Schegel (1974), though, who strongly suggested the name of Le Gros again, believing it to show the typical style of the French artist, with “great ease of movement and elegant lines that tend to lighten the figures”. This attribution was fully supported in all successive studies until recently when Walker (2002) and Marchionne Gunter (2003) proposed, on the basis of archival evidence, that the group be ascribed to the Paduan Francesco Moratti (1686-1719), who was also involved in the long and tortuous process of depicting Innocent XI.

 Cristiano Giometti

Bibliography

A.E. Brinckmann, Barock-Bozzetti, 2 voll., Frankfurt am Main 1923-24, pp. 118-120; M.V. Brugnoli, Due bozzetti del Seicento: Ercole Ferrata e Pierre Etienne Monnot, in "Bollettino d'arte", 45 (1960), pp. 339-345; U. Schlegel, Bozzetti in Terracotta by Pietro Stefano Monnot, in "Boston Museum Bulletin", LXXII, (1974), p. 60; R. Engass, Early Eighteenth-century sculpture in Rome, University Park, Pennsylvania 1976, p. 84; M. G. Barberini (ed.), Sculture in terracotta del Barocco romano. Bozzetti e modelli del Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia, exh. cat., Rome 1991, p. 62; A. Bacchi, L'operatione con li modelli': Pierre Etienne Monnot e Carlo Maratta a confronto, in "Ricerche di Storia dell'Arte", 55, (1995), pp. 43; G. Bissel, Pierre Le Gros, 1666-1719, Reading 1997, p. 41; O. Ferrari and S. Papaldo, Le sculture del Seicento a Roma, Rome 1999, p. 507; S. Walker, Livio Odescalchi, Pietro Stefano Monnot e Carlo Maratta: una rivalutazione alla luce di nuovi documenti, in E. Debenedetti (ed.), Sculture romane del Settecento, II, Rome 2002, pp. 23-29; A. Marchionne Gunter, L'attività di due scultori nella Roma degli Albani: gli inventari di Pietro Papaleo e Francesco Moratti, in E. Debenedetti (ed.), Sculture romane del Settecento, III, La professione dello scultore, "Studi sul Settecento Romano", 19, (2003), p. 77