Bronze Figure of Alexander, North Italian 16th century

North Italian, 16th century
Alexander the Great
Bronze, on a later stone base
14.7 cm. / 5 ¾ ins (the figure), 18 cm. / 7 ins overall

PROVENANCE:
French private collection

This interesting small bronze figure of Alexander the Great was executed in late Renaissance Italy, when the study of antiquities was active in cities such as Florence, Padua, Mantua and Venice.

It shows a fragmentary, armless torso of Alexander standing naked in contrapposto looking to dexter with his weight on his right leg. His twisting, well-defined musculature indicates he is a young virile male, which is also evidenced by his long hair parted in the centre and flowing in luscious locks back across the head.

Judging by the stance, hairstyle and heroic aspect, the present figure was inspired by an ancient bronze statuette of Alexander the Great, which itself would have derived from a lost bronze statue of Alexander Doryphorus (the ‘Spear-thrower’), executed in the late fourth century BC by the Greek sculptor Lysippos (see Stewart, op. cit.). For a related ancient statuette of Alexander, the type of which could have served as a compositional model for the present figure, see the bronze in The Harvard Art Museums (Obj. no. 1956.20).

The present figure likely originates from a north Italian workshop in the sixteenth century and would have been cast from a wax or terracotta model which was fragmentary and intentionally damaged, to make it appear to be a genuine antiquity.

For a comparable Renaissance-period torso based on an antique prototype, see the male figure in the Metropolitan Museum, New York (acc. no. 64.101.1432), which is assumed to originate from Ferrara in northern Italy and catalogued as late fifteenth century.