Walter Padovani established his gallery in Milan in 2000, in the prestigious fashion district. The Gallery mainly deals in Italian sculptures, paintings and works of art from the 17th to the 19th century. The major guidelines of the business relate to research with a particular attention to quality, provenance and condition, as well as the close collaboration with art historians. Over the years, the Gallery has sold works to Italian and international private collectors and museums. It also offers the following services: estimates, appraisals, assistance and advice for the formation of collections and asset divisions, support and advice for Export Offices paperwork, handling and restoration of works of art.
Two cabinets with ten drawers containing the richness of the Terraqueous Orb. Within one cabinet, there is a collection showcasing the wonders of the Earth: marbles, breccias, alabasters, paesina stones, hard stones, silicified woods. The other tells the tale of the Sea, with shells, fossils, shark teeth, and corals. They testify to the desire to organize knowledge, to bring order to chaos: containers whose purpose is to overcome the dichotomy between disorder and order, they also represent the possibility of infinite journeys through space and time, with just a simple gesture like opening a drawer.
Signed and dated: “P.LABRUZZI. ROMA. AN. 1774”
Cast after models by Francesco Maria Ravaschio (Genoa, 1743 -1820). Bibliography: F. Alizeri, "Notizie dei professori del disegno in Liguria dalla fondazione dell’Accademia", 3 vols., Genoa 1864-66, II, p. 201; A. González-Palacios, "Ristudiando i Righetti", in "Antologia di Belle Arti”, 39-42 (1991-1992), pp. 17-46; F. Haskell, N. Penny, "L’antico nella storia del gusto. La seduzione della scultura classica", Turin 1984.
This sculpture in the round portrays a beautiful woman reclining in a very elegant pose, deep in solitary contemplation, emphasised by her lowered gaze. Both for the typology of the sculpture and the peculiar treatment of the surfaces this Venus resembles the artistic production of Giovanni Bonazza, whose works include a series of small marbles on different subjects consisting of representations of reclining figures. These include a Reclining Nymph in the Dallas Museum of Art (Dallas), a Venus and Cupid in the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe (Hamburg), and three sculptures depicting the Penitent Magdalene in the Musei Civici in Padua, one of which in particular seems to be an ideal companion piece to a Penitent St Jerome, signed and now in the University Library of Padua. Also worth mentioning for its extraordinary quality is another Penitent St Jerome in the Monastery of San Francesco in Rovigno (Istria).
Provenance: Private collection, Italy; Heim Gallery, London; Arthur M. Sackler collection, New York. Exhibitions: C. Avery, A. Laing, "Fingerprints of the Artist: European Terra-Cotta Sculpture from the Arthur M. Sackler collections", exhibition. catalogue, Washington, New York, Cambridge (Mass.), 1980-1981, pp. 66-67, no. 17; J.D. Draper, "European Terracottas from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections", exhibition. catalogue, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1981, no. 10; I. Wardropper, "European Terracotta Sculpture from the Arthur M. Sackler collections", exhibition. catalogue, Art Institute of Chicago, 1987-1988, no. 5. Bibliography: C. Avery, A. Laing, ed. by, "Fingerprints of the Artist: European Terra-Cotta Sculpture from the Arthur M. Sackler collections", 1980-1981, Cambridge, pp. 66-67, no. 17.; J. Montagu, "Alessandro Algardi", 2 voll., J. Montagu, 1985, Hew Haven and London, II, p. 343, no. 33, fig. 217.
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