My boss has asked me to pin down information regarding the background of a
work donated to our museum. The work is a bronze boar fitted as a fountain,
perhaps produced by Giuseppe Benelli (1819-1861, Florence) as an 1856-1857
reproduction of the "Wild Boar", a Hellenistic marble boar in the Galleria
degli Uffizi in Florence. There are 3 such Benelli boars in Kansas City, all
purchased by the same gentleman named Nichols about the 1940s. Our boar is
inscribed in Italian to the left of the left front leg along the base "G.
Benelli modeled this base in 1856. The remainder of the work by Clemente
Papigetto in 1857." The question: Benelli produced only 3 boars according to
the Kansas City information, making ours suspect. So, we are trying to pin
down if Benelli produced more than 3 boars. We have run into a dead end
trying to locate the source of our donated work through the information
provided by the donor of the boar (the galleries in her records of purchase
are no longer in business). I've gathered the information available from
Kansas City and have tried to contact the Galleria degli Uffizi using
several of their contact email addresses on their website. My emails are
returned as undeliverable mail.
My questions for the ARLIS experts: Does anyone know how I can find out how
many boars Benelli produced? Is there a way to find out why the base would
have been produced in 1856 before the boar itself, and why the boar was
completed by Papigetto instead of Benelli? Is there some secret to sending
emails to Europe that I'm missing, so that's why mine are not deliverable?
I'm very grateful for any information anyone can provide. Thanks so much for
your input.
Ginger Specian
R.W. Norton Art Gallery
4747 Creswell Ave.
Shreveport, LA 71106
318-865-4201
fax 318-869-0435
email [log in to unmask]
__________________________________________________________________
Mail submissions to [log in to unmask]
For information about joining ARLIS/NA see:
http://www.arlisna.org//membership.html
Send administrative matters (file requests, subscription requests, etc)
to [log in to unmask]
ARLIS-L Archives and subscription maintenance:
http://lsv.uky.edu/archives/arlis-l.html
Questions may be addressed to list owner (Kerri Scannell) at: [log in to unmask]
|