A TERRACOTTA BUST OF CHRIST

This beautifully executed head may have been a full scale model for a marble or it may always have been intended to be a finished work of art in its own right. It shares many characteristics with the work of sculptors active in Naples in the late 17th and early 18th century such as Lorenzo Vaccaro (1655-1706) and his son Domenico Antonio Vaccaro (1678-1745).

Among the latter’s works one may cite the relief he executed of the Deposed Christ with Angels for the high altar of S. Giacomo degli Spagnoli in Naples as having a closely similar facial type (illustrated in Fittipaldi, op. cit., fig. 38). Both have the same slightly rounded forehead, long face, full lips and gently pointed beard. Further similarities to Neapolitan sculptors of the period include a polychrome carved wood figure of the Resurrected Christ by Giovanni Battista Antonini (parish church of S. Maria del, Lauro, Meta di Sorrento, illustrated in ibid, fig. 123) which displays a comparable facial type but also the same distinctive hair, flowing out behind the head in thick curls.