A BRONZE FIGURE OF VENUS OR AMPHITRITE

Previously ascribed to Jerome Duquesnoy, another version of this model in private hands was recently found to bear the signature of Francesco Fanelli, an Italian artist who became the court sculptor to Charles I. As such, the current bronze, along with other versions, such as those in the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna, inv. no. KK 8932), Rijksmuseum (Amsterdam, inv. no. 5850) and the National Gallery of Art (Washington, inv. no. 80.4.10), have been subsequently attributed to Fanelli.

The statuette in Vienna was in the collection of the Archduke Leopold Wilhelm (1614-62), the second son of Emperor Ferdinand II and regent of the Spanish Netherlands from 1647 to 1656. He amassed an extensive collection of artworks, including over 1400 paintings and 500 sculptures, which provided the foundation of the Kunsthistorisches Museum. The statuette of Venus can be seen in the 1652 painting of the Archduke's gallery in Brussels by David Teniers the Younger (KHM, inv. no. 739), where it appears in a prominent position on the cabinet beside the window. This provides a terminus ante quem for the creation of the present model which is comparable in quality and facture to the version in Vienna.