Entourage de GIUSTO LE COURT dit aussi Josse Le... Lot n° 28

Venice, end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th century.Suite of twelve allegorical busts in white marble H. 78-86 cm, W. 49-62 cm, D. 15-28 cm This suite of busts in white marble associates the gods and goddesses of the Roman pantheon - Diana and Mercury - with the seasons - Winter. It reflects the cosmopolitanism of the Serenissima, which drew on the sources of Genoese, Bolognese, French and German art in reaction to the Roman Baroque and was illustrated in particular in the work of the Flemish artist Josse Le Corte, known as Giusto Le Court (1627-1679). The latter is the author of remarkable allegorical busts representing the vices and virtues such as Envy in the Ca'Rezzonico in Venice (fig. 1) or Justice and Strength in San Lazzaro dei Mendicanti (monument to Alvise Mocenigo). Our twelve busts with eloquent headdresses, of fruits and seasonal flowers or diadems and helmets adorned with their attributes, and with half-bare chests, emerge in the middle of bubbling draperies in the manner of Le Court's figures. They borrow from the master faces with soft and delicate features comparable to that of the Diana of the Palacio de la Granja (fig. 2). Our Diana, recognizable by the crescent moon that crowns her, seems however to have forgotten her modesty during the pause. These twelve busts, intended to adorn the staircase of a large Venetian palace, are exemplary witnesses of the Baroque in Venice. They reflect the Flemish tradition revisited through the prism of Bernini (Naples, 1598 - Rome, 1620), from whom Giusto Le Court drew inspiration and who contributed to the fortune of his style perpetuated by his numerous pupils such as Enrico Menrigo (or Heinrich Meyrich, 1638/1639 - 1723), attested to in Venice from 1679.