Attribué à JACOPO DEL DUCA (Cefalù, 1520 - Messine,... Lot n° 1

SIBYLLE OF CUMES About 1590 Bronze H. 104 cm, W. 81 cm, D. 62 cm Provenance Collection, Paris Bibliography Alexandre P. Rosenberg, "The Parcae" - Two marble busts by Francesco da Sangallo, 1570, after a 1513-1515 project of Michelangelo New York, 1986 (3rd revised edition), reproduced p. 23, fig. 10 Certificate of Dr. Armel Bouvier for CIRAM attesting to the authenticity of the bust dated by thermoluminescence to circa 1590 (± 50 years), in Pessac, June 4, 2014 In 1986, this bronze was located in a private collection in Paris. It was then attributed to an artist from the circle of Francesco da Sangallo, a Florentine sculptor and architect who worked in Rome alongside Michelangelo (fig. 1). Alexander P. Rosenberg has compared it with two other bronze busts from the Renaissance, representing Atropos and Lachesis, two of the three Fates. Atropos, which belongs to the Jean Zanchi collection in Lausanne, is attributed to Michelangelo (fig. 2). According to Amadore Porcella, it is the bronze that was sent to France by the artist at the same time as the David and Goliath.1 Lachesis, which was sold on the American market in 1963, was first attributed to the master before being presented by the art historian A. Ciechanowiecki as a work by his most eminent disciple, Jacopo del Duca (fig. 3).2 According to the New York dealer, the three busts come from the same workshop. The bust of the Sibyl of Cumae is a volume transcription of the Sibyl of Cumae painted on the Sistine Chapel vault by Michelangelo in 1511 (fig. 4). Thermoluminescence dating by CIRAM in 2014 confirmed that it was indeed a work of the Renaissance. The cast is dated to ca. 1590, plus or minus 50 years (fig. 5). Between 1562 and 1587, Jacopo del Dua executed five bronze tabernacles, decorated with bas-reliefs. He first made the one in the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Rome, in collaboration with Michelangelo, and then the others, scrupulously following the models left by the master.3 After Michelangelo's death in 1564, Jacopo del Duca was best placed to adapt in bronze the design of the Sibyl of Cumae painted on the vault of the Sistine Chapel. We find the same powerful arm, with prominent muscles; the same intelligence in the rendering of the folds and expressions of the face.