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Gian Lorenzo Bernini

In Partnership with Benappi Fine Art

Portrait of a Gentleman

Rome, c. 1670–75

This splendid marble bust is one of the last masterpieces executed by the greatest sculptor of the XVII century, Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The essential formal syntax of this beautiful sculpture brings out the deep and individual character and the sitter’s impressive living energy. 
The bust belongs to a later period of the artist’s career, and it shows close similarities to Bernini’s portraits of the 1670s: the monumental Portrait of Pope Clement X, or to the kneeling figure of Alexander VII for the monument in Saint Peter’s Basilica. In these three sculptures, the marks of the drill, deliberately left visible on the rendering of hair, are almost identical.
These last masterpieces perfectly illustrate how far Bernini was still seeking for solutions in order to render a specific character in the marble stone without having to resort to color. 

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Info

GIAN LORENZO BERNINI
Naples 1598–1680 Rome

PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN
Rome, c. 1670–75

 

  • Medium/Dimensions

    Marble,  hight, 54.5 cm

  • Literature

    Ursula Schlegel, Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Ritratto di Pietro Bernini, in Per la storia della scultura: Materiali inediti e poco noti, ed. M. Ferretti, Turin, 1992, p. 103-109

    Charles Avery, Bernini: Genius of the Baroque, Boston 1997, p. 14

    Tomaso Montanari, Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Rome 2004, p. 29

    Andrea Bacchi, To portray from life…, in Bernini: The Last Portrait Bust, New York 2005, pp. 33–50

    Hans-Ulrich Kessler, Pietro Bernini (1562-1629), Munich 2005, p. 263, 414 f

    Sarah McPhee, Bernini’s Portrait of a Gentleman, in Bernini: The Last Portrait Bust, New York 2005, pp. 53–66

    Tomaso Montanari, Bernini and a Gentleman: le chef d’oeuvre inconnu, in Bernini: The Last Portrait Bust, New York 2005, pp. 9–31

    Tomaso Montanari, Percorsi per cinquant’anni di studi berniniani, in «Studiolo», 3, 2005, p. 279

    Andrea Bacchi, Tomaso Montanari, Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi, Dimitrios Zikos (eds.), I Marmi Vivi: Bernini e la Nascita del Ritratto Barocco, exh. cat. Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello 2009, p. 349, no A 35

  • Exhibitions

    Andrea Bacchi, Catherine Hess, Jennifer Montagu (eds.), Bernini and the Birth of Baroque Portrait Sculpture, exh. cat. The J. Paul Getty Museum Los Angeles and The National Gallery of Canada, Ottowa 2008, p 272-275, checklist of the autograph works: no. A 35

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