Ram

Object belonging

One's own

Category

Bronze sculpture

City

Rome

Location

Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia

Specific location

Room 16

Inventory

PV 09235

Material and technique

Bronze, natural brown patina, black varnish

Author

Andrea Briosco called Riccio (c. 1470 - 1532)

Dating

1510 (?)

Dimensions

16.9 x 4.5 x 20 cm.

Origin

Barsanti Collection (1934)

Image copyright

SSPSAE e per il Polo Museale della città di Roma

Short description

In 1922 Pollak attributed the bronze entitled Ram with a Laurel, from the Barsanti collection, to Riccio. He described it as “a magnificent, surprisingly beautiful and dignified animal, with a tight-fitting laurel wreath on its head…an original and authentic work by the great master, Riccio, and not a studio copy…wonderfully conserved, with fine detailing in the carving”. Santangelo offered a more concise judgement in 1954, calling it “a superb example of its type, amongst the finest, with a sacrificial wreath around its horns and its fleece untrimmed around the stomach”. Radcliffe was equally concise, considering it “modelled in wax by Riccio…the finest known example”. There are numerous versions of this type of ram, of varying quality, which sometimes show slight variations in the bronze finish. This bronze should not be read as part of the tradition of animal sculpture, representative of the keen interest of Paduan artists in nature. Rather the well-defined wreath between the horns suggests a deeper meaning. The wreath is made of laurel leaves, a plant that was a pagan symbol, but was also adopted in Christian representation. A goat was the mount of Pan, Aphrodite and Dionysius, and was consecrated and sacrificed to the latter, in Euripides; indeed Dionysius transformed into a goat to escape from Olympus during Typhon’s attack on Zeus. The symbolism of the goat in the bible is somewhat different. In Leviticus, God commands Moses to perform an annual ritual to restore order, which was disturbed by the sin of the Israelites: two goats were led in front of the ark of the covenant, one of which was the ‘scapegoat’, and the other offered as a sacrifice to God (Leviticus 16). The Fathers of the Church are often put alongside Christ and the apostoles next to the ram, described as “an animal fit to be commanded who guides lambs to plentiful pastures and refreshing waters” (Basilio di Cesarea, Omelie sui Salmi). It is difficult to tell which of these two antithetical worlds, the pagan and the Christian, Riccio references here, given that both elements are often present in his work. The mixture of classical elements and moments from the Old and New Testaments is, in fact, a recurring characteristic of the artist who executed the relief on the huge Paschal Candelabrum in the Basilica del Santo in Padua, where the sacrifice of the lamb is graphically depicted in front of a statue of Christ, like a sacrifice before a pagan god. Recently Kryza Gersch, in a catalogue of an American exhibition on Riccio, stated that the attributions of Bode and Planiscig were based on the comparison with motifs present in the Paschal Candelabrum in the Basilica del Santo and in the Shepherd Milking a Goat in the Bargello in Florence. Gersch though believes that “interpreting these depictions of goats in both a pagan and Christian context is typical of Riccio’s work…this is the main reason these models are attributed to the artist, since he visually expresses the idea of syncretism of religions, which was, at that time, one of the main topics of discussion in intellectual circles in Padua”.

Pietro Cannata

Bibliography

W. von Bode, Die Italienischen Bronzenstatuetten der Renaissance, Berlin 1922, p.3; L. Pollak, Raccolta Alfredo Barsanti (Trecento-Settecento), catalogue of the collection, Bergamo 1922, n. 8 p. 23; L. Planiscig, Die Bronzeplastiken: Statuetten, Reliefs, Geräte und Plaketten, Wien 1924, n. 69 p. 40; L. Planiscig, Andrea Riccio, Vienna 1927, pp. 197 and 486 no. 144; L. Planiscig, Andrea Riccio: candelabro del santo, Florence 1947, p. 7; A. Santangelo, Museo di Palazzo Venezia. Catalogo delle sculture, Rome 1954, p. 29; Italian Bronze Statuettes, exh. cat., London 1961, no. 54; Meesters van het brons der Italiaanse Renaissance, exh. cat., Amsterdam 1961, no. 51; Bronzetti italiani del Rinascimento: catalogo della mostra, Florence 1962, no. 50; H. R. Weihrauch, Europäische Bronzestatuetten,  Braunschweig 1967, p. 501, no. 149;  D. Blume, Zur Technik des Bronzegusses in der Renaissance, in A. Beyer (ed.), Natur und Antike in der Renaissance, exh. cat., Frankfurt am Main 1985, pp. 479-480;  A. Radcliffe, Replicas, copies and counterfeits of early Italian bronzes, in "Apollo" 1986, 295, p. 183-187; U. Berger - V. Krahn, Bronzen der Renaissance und des Barock: Katalog der Sammlung, Braunschweig 1994, no. 16 p. 43; E. von Binnebeke, Bronssculptuur-Bronze sculptur. Beeldhowkunst 1500-1800 in de collectie van het Museum Boymans-van Beuningnen, Rotterdam 1994, no. 18 p. 114; P. Cannata in, Donatello e il suo tempo:il bronzetto a Padova nel Quattrocento e nel Cinquecento, Milan 2001, no. 18 pp. 114-115; A. Victoria, Renaissance and baroque bronzes from the Fitzwilliam Museum, London 2002, pp. 122-125; V. Krahn, Bronzetti veneziani: die Venezianischen Kleinbronzen der Renaissance aus dem Bode-Museum Berlin, Köln 2003, no. 75 pp. 242-244; P. Cannata in A. Bacchi - L. Giacomelli, Rinascimento e passione per l'Antico. Andrea Riccio e il suo tempo, catalogo mostra, Trento 2008, n. 66 pp. 378-379; P. Cannata, in M. G. Barberini - M. S. Sconci (a cura di), Guida al Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia, Roma 2009, n. 63 p. 68; D. Allen, Andrea Riccio. Renaissance Master of Bronze, exh. cat., New York 2010, no. 5 pp. 122-127; C. Kryza-Gersch in D. Allen, Andrea Riccio. Renaissance Master of Bronze,  exh. cat., New York 2010, no. 6 pp. 128-133.