Cupid Carving His Bow, Francesco Mazzola, follower of Parmigianino

Follower of FRANCESCO MAZZOLA, known as IL PARMIGIANINO (Parma, 1503 - Casalmaggiore, 1540)
Cupid Carving His Bow
(as the triumph of love and desire over reason and knowledge)

Oil on canvas
138 x 105 cm/ Framed 166 x 105 cm.

Reframed 19th century. Scattered retouches, excellent state of preservation.
Valuable gilded wooden frame with moulded edges from the end of the 19th century

Important painting depicting Cupid full-length intent on carving his bow, oil on canvas attributable to an artist who was a follower of Francesco Mazzola, known as Parmigianino, active between the 17th and 18th centuries.

The painting, which proves to be of excellent quality, is a study dedicated to the famous altarpiece depicting Cupid making his bow painted by Parmigianino in 1533/35 for the noble cavalier Francesco Baiardo, a friend and patron of the painter, now housed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna (see the museum's official website for details).

This complex iconography and the way it is depicted have made the painting an extraordinary example of the artist's ingenuity and refinement. Indeed, his contemporaries recognised the beauty of style and refinement of line that characterised his works.

For these reasons, the work enjoyed enormous popularity and exerted a profound and lasting influence, as demonstrated by the fact that over the years it was copied and taken as a model by numerous artists. More than 50 copies can be counted, the most illustrious of which are Joseph Heintz the Elder's and Rubens' 1614 copy, which is kept at the Alte Pinakothek in Munich [1].

The painting depicts the young Cupid who, occupying the entire scene, tall and narrow to perfectly frame his statuesque body, is intent on making the bow with which he shoots his arrows of love.

He is depicted not as a child but as an adolescent, an aspect that was deliberately intended to lend a more sensual character to the composition: the figure conceived by Parmigianino was certainly inspired by the ancient Hellenistic sculptures depicting the young man.

Cupid turns around and looks seductively at the viewer, disrespectfully pointing his left leg at two books to support the arch, symbolising the triumph of love and desire over reason and knowledge.

Attention to the lower half of the painting is drawn to the two putti glimpsed between Cupid's legs, locked in an embrace. The little boy, who is winged, directs a look of mischievous complicity at the viewer, forcefully clutching the little girl, who tries to rebel in a grimace of rage, and grasps her right wrist as if directing her to touch Cupid, that is, to submit to Love.

The two children are identified as the snares of unrequited love, which Cupid himself will soon placate with one of his arrows. Various interpretative hypotheses have been formulated on the pair of cupids: Anteros and Liseros (respectively the masculine impulse that gives strength to love and the feminine principle that counteracts its vehemence), or Sacred Love and Profane Love.

The characteristics of the pictorial draftsmanship suggest a date between the 17th and 18th centuries and the author is certainly to be sought among the various followers who, looking to the Parma master as an example of style, replicated some very successful models and were therefore in great demand among the prestigious patrons of the time.

[1]
- Joseph Heintz the Elder
Amore fabbrica l'arco (from Parmigianino)
Franco Maria Ricci Collection
- Peter Paul Rubens
Cupid Carving the Bow, 1614
Alte Pinakothek Munich,