Pair of Angels Playing Trumpets

Object belonging

One's own

Category

Bronze sculpture

City

Rome

Location

Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia

Specific location

Room 16

Inventory

PV 09328-29

Material and technique

Bronze, natural brown-green patina, traces of black lacquer

Author

Niccolò Roccatagliata (c. 1559 -1629)

Dating

c. 1596

Dimensions

31.5 x 13 x 19 cm. / 32 x 13 x 20 cm.

Origin

Barsanti Collection (1934)

Image copyright

SSPSAE e per il Polo Museale della città di Roma

Short description

These two angels with trumpets are their mirror images, indicating that they were to be arranged together. It is likely that they were designed as finials for a pair of andirons – as much is suggested by their poor state of conservation. There are numerous complete andirons with similar angels, attributed to Roccatagliata or his studio, in, amongst others, the Bargello in Florence, the Galleria Colonna in Rome and the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum in Munich.

Pietro Cannata

Bibliography

L. Pollak, Raccolta Alfredo Barsanti (Trecento-Settecento), Bergamo 1922, nos. 101-102, pp. 140-141; A. Santangelo, Museo di Palazzo Venezia. Catalogo delle sculture, Rome 1954, pp. 43 and 45; L. Camins, Renaissance & baroque bronzes from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection, San Francisco 1988, no. 18, pp. 60-61.