Cesare Lapini (Italian, Fl. 1880-1910)

The present composition exhibits considerable skill in carving Romeo climbing a ladder to Juliet’s balcony and showing each figure balanced beautifully in the moment of embrace. It is interesting to note that Shakespeare makes no reference to a balcony, rather it was artistic depictions in the 19th century which firmly established the moment when Romeo ‘With love's light wings did I o'er-perch these walls’ as 'The Balcony Scene.'
From the second half of the 19th century the Florentine studios fed considerable demand for genre sculpture from Europe, Russia and the Americas. A subject of romantic resonance, Romeo and Juliet was much in demand, as evidenced by the survival of closely related compositions by Antonio Frilli and Ferdinando Vichi. A very similar marble by Fausto Biggi of Carrara.