A standing bull
probably French School
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
circa 1850 - 1900
Materials
Bronze
Measurements
353 mm (Height) x 121 mm (Depth); 385 mm (Length)
Place of origin
France
Order this imageCollection
Anglesey Abbey, Cambridgeshire
NT 515098
Summary
Bronze, A standing bull, probably French School, c. 1850-1900. A bronze figure of a bull, mounted on a separately cast base with a naturalistic surface and six scrolling feet, those in centre of long side decorated with a flower.
Full description
The figure of the bull is modelled on a Roman small marble figure of a bull excavated at Ostia near Rome between 1774 and 1780, and now in the Sala degli Animali of the Museo Pio-Clementino in the Vatican Rome. The marble was from the late eighteenth century reproduced in bronze in Roman workshops; there are examples from in the Wallace Collection, London and in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. It continued to be reproduced until well into the nineteenth century, examples being found incorporated into Louis XV-style clocks made in imitation of 18th-century models. Of significantly less good quality than those in London and Oxford, the Anglesey Abbey version is unlikely to have been made before the middle of the nineteenth century. The small horns seen in the original and the early derivations have been replaced by a sharp curving pair, more akin to nineteenth-century notions of bull-fighting, whilst the rococo-style base hints at a supposed origin in the eighteenth century. Jeremy Warren 2019
Provenance
Acquired by Urban Huttleston Rogers Broughton, 1st Lord Fairhaven (1896-1966) by 1932; identifiable in the Anglesey Abbey inventory of 1932, p. 13, Oak Room, valued at £30; identifiable in the Anglesey Abbey inventory of 1940, p. 33, Newmarket Room, valued at £30; bequeathed to the National Trust by Lord Fairhaven with the house and the rest of the contents.
Credit line
Anglesey Abbey, The Fairhaven Collection (The National Trust)
Makers and roles
probably French School, sculptor
References
‘Anglesey Abbey, Lode, Cambridgeshire. An Inventory and Valuation of Furniture, Pictures, Ornamental Objects, Household Effects and A Collection of Miniatures.. prepared for Insurance Purposes’, Turner, Lord and Ransom, November 1932, p. 13. 'Anglesey Abbey, Lode, Cambridgeshire. An Inventory and Valuation of Furniture, Books, Ornamental Items & Household Effects .. prepared for Insurance Purposes’, Turner, Lord and Ransom, April 1940, p. 33. Christie, Manson & Woods 1971: The National Trust, Anglesey Abbey, Cambridge. Inventory: Furniture, Textiles, Porcelain, Bronzes, Sculpture and Garden Ornaments’, 1971, p. 151. Penny 1992: Nicholas Penny, Catalogue of European Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum, 1540 to the Present Day, 3 vols., Oxford 1992, vol. I, pp. 222-23, no. 162. Warren 2016: Jeremy Warren, The Wallace Collection. Catalogue of Italian Sculpture, 2 vols., London 2016, vol. II, pp. 704-07, no. 148.