Live Auction 10648Christie's Interiors - Style & Spirit
AN ITALIAN TERRACOTTA AND PAPIER MACHE CRECHE GROUP OF THREE SHOEMAKERS
Lot 296

AN ITALIAN TERRACOTTA AND PAPIER MACHE CRECHE GROUP OF THREE SHOEMAKERS

LATE 19TH CENTURY, PROBABLY BY GAETANO GEMMALO, SICILY

Closed2 June 2015

Price Realised

GBP 1,875

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AN ITALIAN TERRACOTTA AND PAPIER MACHE CRECHE GROUP OF THREE SHOEMAKERS
LATE 19TH CENTURY, PROBABLY BY GAETANO GEMMALO, SICILY
Modelled as a shoemaker stretching a piece of leather, as his companion demonstrates a hole in the sole of the shoe he has removed from his foot., the young apprentice with rope cord, with hand written ink label to the front of the painted cork base inscribed 'Ciambattini di Catalagirona/ Gaetano Gemmalo, 1968'
12 ¼ in. (31 cm.) high; 15 ½ in. (39.5 cm.) wide

Specialist note

The ink inscribed label identifies this work as by the hand of Gaetano Gammalo (c.1800-c.1899), a sculptor from Messina, Sicily, active in the late nineteenth century. A large tableau depicting the Massacre of the Innocents by Gemmalo is on view at the Museo della Devozione in Calvaruso, Sicily.