Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory 9789048557509

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Exhibiting Antonio Canova Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory

Christina Ferando

Amsterdam University Press

The publication of this book is made possible by grants from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and the Frederick W. Hilles Publication Fund of Yale University.

Cover illustration: Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis, ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Bettina Jacot-Descombes Cover design: Coördesign, Leiden Lay-out: Crius Group, Hulshout isbn 978 94 6372 409 8 e-isbn 978 90 4855 750 9 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098 nur 654 © C. Ferando/ Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2023 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Every effort has been made to obtain permission to use all copyrighted illustrations reproduced in this book. Nonetheless, whosoever believes to have rights to this material is advised to contact the publisher.



Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

7

Acknowledgements

17

Introduction: Canova on Display

21

1. Imagining Sculptural Practice Art as a Political Tool Sculpture, Eroticism, and the Senses Shifting Models of Display and Engagement Sculptural Practice in the Literary Imagination The Authority of the Author An Imperfect Understanding of Sculpture

43 43 46 53 61 65 73

2. Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns Imitation as Creative Practice The Artist as Beholder The Studio as Exhibition Space Perseus in the Museum Changing Ideas of Cultural Patrimony Imitation as Plagiarism

83 83 95 97 101 107 112

3. Anatomizing the Female Nude The Creation of a Modern Venus Venus in the Boudoir The Tinted Surface The Softness of Flesh The Anatomy of Sculpture Venus and the Clinical Gaze

123 123 127 138 145 151 165

4. Challenging the Supremacy of Painting Canova and the Veneto Uniting Canova and Titian Promoting Contemporary Venetian Art Celebrating Venice’s Cultural Patrimony Restoring Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin Establishing the Supremacy of Sculpture

177 177 179 183 188 192 201

5. Defining Modern Sculpture A Foreign Artist in France Romanticizing Artistic Production Expression and the Art of Sculpture Collecting as Expression of the Self Sentiment, Interiority, and Universality Sculpture as a Modern Art

217 217 220 227 231 247 252

Conclusion: Aftereffects

259

Bibliography Index

265 283



List of Illustrations

Fig. 0.1 Fig. 0.2

Fig. 0.3

Fig. 0.4 Fig. 0.5 Fig. 0.6 Fig. 0.7 Fig. 0.8

Fig. 0.9 Fig. 0.10 Fig. 0.11

Fig. 0.12

Thomas Lawrence, Portrait of the Italian Sculptor Antonio Canova (1757–1822). Oil on canvas, 91 × 71 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY22 L. & F., One-half of stereograph showing Canova’s Cupid and Psyche in the Musée du Louvre, 1856–1890. Notice the handle on the base of the sculpture which enables it to turn. Glass, paper, and sealed edge, 8.4 × 17.1 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam25 Anonymous, Canova’s Creugas, Triumphant Perseus, and Damoxenes in situ in the Vatican Museums, 1890–1910. Part of photo album of a journey through Southern Europe and the Middle East. Gelatin silver print, 19 × 24.6 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam26 Benjamin Zix, The Emperor Napoleon and Empress Marie-Louise Visiting the Laocoön Room in the Louvre by Torchlight, ca. 1804–1811. Pen and ink, 26 × 29 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY27 Antonio Canova, Psyche, 1793–1794. Marble, 150 × 50 × 60 cm; pedestal 80 × 60 cm. Kunsthalle Bremen, Germany. © Kunsthalle Bremen – Lars Lohrisch – ARTOTHEK28 Albert Christoph Dies, The Temple of Leopoldine with Lake, 1807. Oil on canvas, 168 × 217 cm. Private collection, Eisenstadt Castle, Eisenstadt, Austria. Esterházy Privatstiftung, Schloss Eisenstadt, Gemäldesammlung, B 9529 Antonio Canova, Three Graces, 1814–1817, in situ at the Duke of Bedford’s Woburn Abbey. From the Woburn Abbey Collection30 Pietro Vitali, “The Gallery of Hercules and Lychas in the Palazzo Torlonia,” frontispiece of P. Vitali, Marmi scolpiti esistenti nel palazzo di S.E. il Sig. Gio. Torlonia. Rome: Presso Vitali, [182–?], vol. 2. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (85-B24588)30 Carl Schmidt, Theseus Temple by Pietro von Nobile in the Volksgarten, Vienna, Perspective, 1820. Graphite, black pen, watercolor, 51.8 × 73.1 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna31 Carl Schmidt, Theseus Temple by Pietro von Nobile in the Volksgarten, Vienna, Cross-Section, 1820. Graphite, black pen, pink wash, 71.5 × 52 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna31 Pietro Nobile, Plan for a Temple for the Maria Christina Monument, Vienna (unrealized), 1803. 25.5 × 11.5 cm. Su concessione della Soprintendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio del Friuli Venezia Giulia, Ministero della Cultura, Fondo Pietro Nobile, vol. 42, no. 1032 Pietro Nobile, Plan for a Temple for the Maria Christina Monument, Vienna (unrealized), 1803. 27.5 × 14.5 cm. Su concessione della Soprintendenza

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio del Friuli Venezia Giulia, Ministero della Cultura, Fondo Pietro Nobile, vol. 42, no. 1132 Fig. 0.13 “Canova’s Studio,” L’Album, giornale letterario e di belle arti. Rome: Tipografia delle belle arti, 1835, vol. 2, no. 37 (Saturday, November 21, 1835): 296. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (85-S84)33 Fig. 1.1 Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis, ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Bettina Jacot-Descombes45 Fig. 1.2 Titian, Venus and Adonis, 1550s. Oil on canvas, 106.7 × 133.4 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Jules Bache Collection, 194948 Fig. 1.3 Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (detail), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Bettina Jacot-Descombes49 Fig. 1.4 Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (rear view), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Flora Bevilacqua50 Fig. 1.5 Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (detail), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Flora Bevilacqua52 Fig. 1.6 “The Berio Palace on Via Toledo, façade,” from Lettera ad un amico nella quale si dà ragguaglio della funzione seguita in Napoli il giorno 6 Settembre del 1772. Per solennizzare il battesimo della Reale Infanta Maria Teresa Carolina primogenita delle LL. MM. delle Due Sicilie il Re Ferdinando IV e Regina Maria Carolina Archiduchessa d’Austria; e delle feste date per quest’oggetto. Naples: Paolo di Simone, 1772. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (89-B14272)54 Fig. 1.7 “The Berio Palace on Via Toledo, façade of interior courtyard,” from Lettera ad un amico nella quale si dà ragguaglio della funzione seguita in Napoli il giorno 6 Settembre del 1772. Per solennizzare il battesimo della Reale Infanta Maria Teresa Carolina primogenita delle LL. MM. delle Due Sicilie il Re Ferdinando IV e Regina Maria Carolina Archiduchessa d’Austria; e delle feste date per quest’oggetto. Naples: Paolo di Simone, 1772. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (89-B14272)55 Fig. 1.8 Giannantonio Selva, Tempietto Dedicated to Ceres, Goddess of Abundance, in the Park of Villa Margherita, now Manfrin, Treviso, Italy, 1783. Photograph, ca. 1910. © Alinari Archives / Umberto Fini / Art Resource, NY57 Fig. 1.9 Daniel Bozhkov, Antonio Canova’s Venus and Adonis in situ, based on Marchesa Boccapaduli’s description, 2007. Pencil drawing, 20.3 × 25.4 cm. Collection of the author © Daniel Bozhkov58

List of Illustrations

Fig. 1.10 Fig. 1.11 Fig. 1.12 Fig. 1.13

Fig. 1.14

Fig. 1.15

Fig. 1.16 Fig. 1.17 Fig. 1.18

Fig. 1.19 Fig. 1.20

Fig. 2.1

9

Jacques Rigaud, View of the Queen’s Theatre from the Rotunda at Stowe, Buckinghamshire, ca. 1739. Pen and ink, brush and wash, 29.5 × 49.5 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 194260 Zecchino, after a drawing by G. B. Bosio, Portrait of Cav.re Carlo Castone Conte della Torre di Rezzonico, ca. 1815–1818. Etching, 21.7 × 15.3 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam63 Antonio Canova’s tools. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy64 Portrait of Tommaso Gargallo, frontispiece from Le opere di Orazio Flacco, recate in versi italiani di Tommaso Gargallo. Como: Figli di C. A. Ostinelli, 1827. Original source K. K. Hofbibliothek, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek. Digital image: Google Books65 Plate XLVIII in “De la sculpture,” from André Felibien, Principes de l’architecture, de la sculpture, de la peinture et des autres arts qui en dépendent: avec un dictionnaire des termes propres à chacun de ces arts. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Coignard, 1676, book 2, 313. General Collection. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University75 Sculpture, différentes opérations pour le travail du marbre et outils, Plate I from Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds., Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc. Paris: Briasson, 1771. Vol. 25 (vol. 8 of the plates). Courtesy the ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, University of Chicago76 Francesco Carradori, “Regole per cavare dalle misure qualunque lavoro di scultura,” Istruzione elementare per gli studiosi della scultura. Florence, [s.n.], 1802, pl. VIII. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York77 Louis Boilly, The Studio of Jean Antoine Houdon (1741–1828), after 1803. Oil on canvas, 86.3 × 105 cm. © Musée d’art, Thomas Henry, Cherbourg / HIP / Art Resource, NY78 “Studio di Bartolomeo Cavaceppi, ove sono state restaurate le statue contenute nella presente Raccolta,” frontispiece from Bartolomeo Cavaceppi, Raccolta d’antiche statue, busti, bassirilievi ed altre sculture restaurate. 3 vols. Rome: 1768–1772. vol. 1. Göttingen State and University Library (SUB), call no. 2 ARCH III, 695:179 Francesco Chiarottini, Canova’s Studio in Via San Giacomo, Rome, ca. 1786. Pen, watercolor, and highlight on paper, 38.5 × 56 cm. Museo Civico, Udine, Italy. © Ghigo G. Roli / Art Resource, NY80 Photomechanical print after François-Xavier Fabre, Portrait of the Sculptor Antonio Canova (1812), 1880–1900. Original painting, Musée Fabre, Montpellier, France. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Miscellaneous Items, Washington, DC81 Charles Joseph Natoire, Life Class at the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, 1746. Pen, black and brown ink, grey wash, watercolor, and traces of graphite over black chalk on laid paper, 45.3 × 32.3 cm. Samuel Courtauld

10 

Fig. 2.2 Fig. 2.3 Fig. 2.4 Fig. 2.5

Fig. 2.6 Fig. 2.7 Fig. 2.8 Fig. 2.9 Fig. 2.10

Fig. 2.11 Fig. 2.12

Fig. 2.13 Fig. 2.14

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Trust, Witt Collection, The Courtauld Gallery, London. Photo © The Courtauld / Bridgeman Images85 Apollo Belvedere, second century CE. Marble, 224 × 118 × 77 cm. Cortile del Belvedere, Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. White Images / Scala / Art Resource, NY86 Antonio Canova, Triumphant Perseus, 1787–1801. Marble, 235 × 190 × 110 cm. Cortile del Belvedere, Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. © Vanni Archive / Art Resource, NY88 Benvenuto Cellini, Perseus with the Head of Medusa, 1545–1553. Bronze, h. 550 cm. Loggia dei Lanzi, Piazza della Signoria, Florence, Italy. Pictures from History / David Henley / Bridgeman Images89 Canova’s annotations (n.d.) on an engraving of the Apollo Belvedere, Plate 35 from Giovanni Volpato and Raffaello Morghen, Principi del disegno tratti dalle piú eccellenti statue antiche: per li giovani che vogliono incamminarsi nello studio delle belle arti. Rome: Pagliarini, 1786. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa91 Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa, 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Fletcher Fund, 196792 Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa (detail), 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fletcher Fund, 196793 Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa (detail, illuminated), 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Fletcher Fund, 1967. © Christine A. Butler94 Antonio Canova, Hercules and Lychas, ca. 1795–1815. Marble, 350 × 152 × 212 cm. Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Rome, Italy. Scala / Ministero per i Beni e le Attività culturali / Art Resource, NY98 Keystone View Company, One-half of stereograph showing the Farnese Hercules, National Museum, Naples, Italy, [between 1860 and 1930]. Photograph, Mount 9 × 18 cm. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, https://www.loc.gov/item/2020683026/99 Jean Jérôme Baugean, Departure for France of the Third Convoy of Statues and Italian Works of Art, 1797. Etching, 45 × 60.6 cm (trimmed). © The Trustees of the British Museum102 Antoine Béranger after Achille Valois, The Entry into Paris of Works Destined for the Musée Napoléon, 1810–1813. Hard porcelain and gilded bronze, 127.2 × 84 cm, opening diameter, 64.9 cm. Manufacture et Musée Nationaux, Sèvres, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY103 The Octagonal Courtyard of the Museo Pio-Clementino, showing gabinetti walls bricked up by Canova. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums105 Hubert Robert, La salle des saisons au Louvre, showing the Crouching Venus, Diana the Huntress and the Laocoön, ca. 1802–1803. Oil on canvas, 37 × 46 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY108

List of Illustrations

Fig. 2.15

11

Jean Bertrand Andrieu after a design by Dominique-Vivant Denon, Medal of the Musée Napoléon (reverse), showing the Laocoön in situ. Bronze, 3.43 cm. Yale University Art Gallery, Transfer from the Yale University Library, Numismatic Collection, 2001, Gift of Dr. William Gilman Thompson, Ph.B. 1877. Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery111 Fig. 2.16 Jean Bertrand Andrieu after a design by Dominique-Vivant Denon, Medal of Musée Napoléon (reverse), showing the Apollo Belvedere in situ, with a small bust of Napoleon over the arch, 1804. Gold, 3.2 cm. Bibliothèque nationale de France111 Fig. 2.17 The French Artist Mourning the Chances of War, 1815. Colored etching. Bibliothèque National de France, Cabinet des Estampes et de la Photographie, Collection Hennin, Inv. no. 13832, Paris113 Fig. 2.18 Pietro Paoletti, Canova Presenting to Pius VII the Monuments of Italian Glory Recovered from Paris in the Vatican State in 1814. Drawing, 25.4 × 34.5 cm. Gabinetto dei Disegni e delle Stampe, Album Cicognara, A. 77, n. 44, Museo Correr, Venice. 2022 © Photo Archive – Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia114 Fig. 2.19 James Anderson, Museo Chiaramonti, ca. 1857–1875. Albumen print, 20 × 25.7 cm. Part of a photo album of 57 photographs of works of art, mostly from the Vatican Museums. Gift of J. P. Filedt Kok, Amsterdam. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam115 Fig. 2.20 Francesco Hayez, Allegory of the Return to Rome of the Works Plundered from the Papal States, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Scala / Art Resource, NY116 Fig. 2.21 Francesco Hayez, Sculpture Honored, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums117 Fig. 2.22 Giovanni Demin, Painting Honored, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums118 Fig. 2.23 Salvatore Passamonti, Medal commemorating the return of looted objects, showing Canova (recto) and the Apollo Belvedere (verso), 1816. Bronze, 6.76 cm. Yale University Art Gallery, Transfer from the Yale University Library, Numismatic Collection, 2001, Gift of Dr. William Gilman Thompson, Ph.B. 1877. Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery119 Fig. 3.1 Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812. Marble, 172 × 55 × 52 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. White Images / Scala / Art Resource, NY124 Fig. 3.2 Fratelli Alinari, Photograph of the Venus de’Medici (first century BCE), ca. 1856–1872. Albumen silver print, 33 × 25.2 cm (Sculpture: Marble, h. 153 cm). J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles124 Fig. 3.3 The Venus de’Medici in the Tribuna in the Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, ca. 1870–1890. Albumen print, 19.5 × 25.3 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam128 Fig. 3.4 Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812 (detail, torso, and side view). Marble, 172 × 55 × 52 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Mondadori Portfolio / Electa / Sergio Anelli / Bridgeman Images130

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Fig. 3.5

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812 (rear view). Marble, 172 × 52 × 55 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Luisa Ricciarini / Bridgeman Images131 Fig. 3.6 The Gabinetto Rotondo in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY132 Fig. 3.7 François Boucher, The Toilette of Venus, 1751. Oil on canvas, 108.3 × 85.1 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Bequest of William K. Vanderbilt, 1920134 Fig. 3.8 Louis-Marin Bonnet after Nicolas-René Jollain, La Toilette, 1781. Color stipple. Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC135 Fig. 3.9 Anonymous, La Toilette Intime, ca. 1765. Colored aquatint, 17.1 × 12.8 cm. Musée Carnavalet, Paris, France. Paris Musées / Musée Carnavalet – Histoire de Paris136 Fig. 3.10 Michelangelo, St. Matthew (detail), 1505–1506. Marble, h. 271 cm. Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY146 Fig. 3.11 Gian-Lorenzo Bernini, The Rape of Persephone (detail), 1621–1622. Marble, 255 cm (without base). Galleria Borghese, Rome, Italy. Photo © Andrea Jemolo / Bridgeman Images148 Fig. 3.12 Jean Raoux, Pygmalion, 1717. Oil on canvas, 128 × 97 cm. Musée Fabre, Montpellier, France. © Musée Fabre de Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole / photographie Frédéric Jaulmes – Reproduction interdite sans autorisation153 Fig. 3.13 Andreas Vesalius, “Organis Nutritioni, Vigesimasecunda Quinti Libri Figura,” De humani corporis fabrica libri septum, 1543. Basileae: [ex officina Ioannis Oporini, 1543]. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University156 Fig. 3.14 “Nella quale so mostrano i muscoli, e le parti, che soggiacciono ai gia indicati membri nell’antecedente tavola,” Plate XIII (based on the Laocoön) from Bernardino Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno. Rome: Domenico de Rossi, herede di Gio. Jacomo de Rossi, 1691. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University157 Fig. 3.15 Plate I from Jean-Galbert Salvage, Anatomie du gladiateur combattant, applicable aux beaux arts; ou, Traité des os, des muscles, du mécanisme de mouvemens, des proportions et des caractères du corps humain. Paris: Auteur, 1812. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Lincoln Kirstein, 1952158 Fig. 3.16 Jean-Galbert Salvage, Écorchés after the Apollo Belvedere, 1806. Plaster, 67 × 34 cm and 67 × 41 × 26 cm, respectively. École national supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris, France. © Beaux-Arts de Paris, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY159 Fig. 3.17 Dessein, Proportions de la Venus de Médicis, Plate XXXVIII from Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc. Paris: Briasson, David, Le Breton, and Durand, 1763. Vol. 20 (vol. 3 of the plates). Courtesy the ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, University of Chicago160 Fig. 3.18 Antonio Canova, Venus de’Medici, n.d. Red chalk on laid pale-blue paper, 50.4 × 36.4 cm. Musei civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy161

List of Illustrations

Fig. 3.19 Fig. 3.20

Fig. 3.21

Fig. 3.22

Fig. 3.23

Fig. 3.24

Fig. 3.25 Fig. 4.1 Fig. 4.2

Fig. 4.3 Fig. 4.4 Fig. 4.5 Fig. 4.6

13

Thomas Patch, A Gathering of Dilettanti around the Medici Venus, ca. 1760–1761 Oil on canvas, 147.2 × 238.3 cm. The Brinsley Ford Collection. ©National Trust Images / Creative Commercial Photography. ©The National Trust / Augustine Ford162 “Tab. Sesta del lib. Tercero,” Plate XXX from Juan Valverde de Amusco, Nicolas Beatrizet, and Gaspar Becerra, Historia de la composicion del cuerpo humano, escrita por Ioan de Valuerde de Hamusco. Rome: Antonio de Salamanca and Antonio Lafrery, 1556. Original source: Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid, Spain. Image from World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021666850/163 François Andriot after Charles Errard, Statua delle Venere de Medici di veduta in profilo […], Plate XXXX from Bernardino Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno. Rome: Domenico de Rossi, herede di Gio. Jacomo de Rossi, 1691. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University164 The Sceleton [sic] of a Woman, in the Same Proportions with the Venus of Medicis, Plate XXXIV from William Cheselden, Osteographia, or the Anatomy of the Bones. London, [s.n.]: 1733[?]. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University166 Clemente Susini, Anatomical Venus, 1780–1782. Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università di Firenze, Museo “La Specola,” Florence, Italy. Photo © Raffaello Bencini / Bridgeman Images167 Clemente Susini, Anatomical Venus, 1780–1782. Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università di Firenze, Museo “La Specola,” Florence, Italy. Photo credit: Saulo Bambi – Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze168 William Heath, A Pair of Broad Bottoms, 1810. Etching, hand-colored, on wove paper, 35 × 25 cm. Courtesy of The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University171 Antonio Canova, Model for the Monument to Titian, ca. 1790–1795. Terracotta, 70 × 69 × 20.5 cm. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy180 Giuseppe Borsato, Leopoldo Cicognara, President of the Accademia in Venice, Showing the Canova Tomb in S. Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, ca. 1827. Oil on canvas, 80 × 61 cm. Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris, France. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY181 Ludovico Lipparini, Portrait of Leopoldo Cicognara with Canova’s Beatrice, 1825. Oil in canvas, 193 × 118 cm. Ca’ Pesaro – Galleria Internazionale d’Arte Moderna, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY182 Antonio Canova, Polinnia, 1817. Marble, 152 × 127 × 72 cm. Hofburg Imperial Palace, Vienna, Austria. © Mark E. Smith / Scala / Art Resource, NY186 Antonio Canova, Bozzetto for Elisa Baciocchi Bonaparte as the Muse Polinnia. Terracotta, 26.8 × 11.5 × 20.5 cm. Private Collection, Turin, Italy187 Giuseppe Borsato, Commemoration of Canova in the Scuola Grande della Carità, 1822. Oil on canvas, 61 × 78 cm. Ca’ Pesaro – Galleria Internazionale d’Arte Moderna, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY191

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 4.7 Titian, Assumption of the Virgin, 1516–1518. Oil on panel, 690 × 360 cm. Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY193 Fig. 4.8 William Hogarth, Time Smoking a Picture, 1761. Etching, 23.3 × 18.5 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam196 Fig. 4.9 Raphael, The Transfiguration, 1817. Oil on panel, 410 × 279 cm. Pinacoteca, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Scala / Art Resource, NY198 Fig. 4.10 Letterio Subba, Antonio Canova in His Studio, ca. 1819. oil on canvas, 70 × 60 cm. Su concessione della Regione Siciliana, Assessorato dei Beni Culturali e della Identità siciliana – Dipartimento dei Beni Culturali e della Identità siciliana – Museo regionale interdisciplinare di Messina199 Fig. 4.11 Antonio Canova, Model for Portrait Bust of Elisa Baciocchi. Plaster, 42 × 28 × 28 cm. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy202 Fig. 4.12 Antonio Canova, Polinnia (side view), 1817. Marble, 152 × 127 × 72 cm. Hofburg Imperial Palace, Vienna, Austria. © Mark E. Smith / Scala / Art Resource, NY205 Fig. 4.13 Pietro Fontana, Engraving of Canova’s Polinnia, from L’omaggio delle Provincie Venete alla Maestà di Carolina Augusta, Imperatrice d’Austria. Venice: Dalla tipografia di Alvisopoli, 1818. Signature: Quellen.Guiden.Ital.Vene.-048; Vienna University Library210 Fig. 4.14 Antonio Canova, Seated Woman, n.d. Tab lowered, showing profile view. Pencil drawing, 21.4 × 15.7 cm. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy211 Fig. 4.15 Antonio Canova, Seated Woman, n.d. Tab raised. Pencil drawing, 21.4 × 15.7 cm. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy211 Fig. 5.1 Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene, 1796. Marble and gilded bronze, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. Genova, Musei di Strada Nuova – Palazzo Tursi, Italy. (© Musei di Strada Nuova, Genova)218 Fig. 5.2 Louis-Léopold Boilly, Napoleon Honoring the Sculptor Cartellier at the Salon of 1808. Oil on canvas, 42 × 61.5 cm. Napoleonmuseum, Arenenberg, Switzerland219 Fig. 5.3 Antonio Canova, Penitent Magdalene, 1793–1794. Clay, 22 × 19 cm. Museo Correr, Venice, Italy. © Photo Archive – Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia223 Fig. 5.4 Donatello, The Penitent Magdalene, ca. 1453–1455. Wood with polychromy and gold, 181 × 51 × 45 cm. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY224 Fig. 5.5 Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (detail), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev225 Fig. 5.6 Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (rear view), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev226 Fig. 5.7 Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, Portrait of Gian-Battista Sommariva, ca. 1815. Oil on canvas, 210 × 156 cm. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan, Italy. © DeA Picture Library / Art Resource, NY232

List of Illustrations

Fig. 5.8 Fig. 5.9 Fig. 5.10 Fig. 5.11

Fig. 5.12 Fig. 5.13

Fig. 5.14

Fig. 5.15 Fig. 5.16

Fig. 5.17 Fig. 5.18

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Anne-Louis Girodet-Trioson, Pygmalion and Galatée, 1819. Oil on canvas, 253 × 202 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY234 François-Louis Dejuinne, Girodet painting “Pygmalion and Galatea”, 1821. Oil on canvas, 65 × 54.5 cm. Musée Girodet, Montargis, France. © F. Lauginie / Musée Girodet, Montargis237 Enamels commissioned by Sommariva of paintings in his collection, in situ at the Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy, 2006–2008. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan, Italy; on deposit at Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy239 Giovanni Beltrami, The Death of Abel, after Michel Martin Drölling fils, 1819. Engraved cornelian, oval frame in gilt bronze, 5 × 3.7 cm, with the frame, 9.8 × 8.8 cm. Signed and dated, Beltrami INC. 1819 / Drolling Fils Pinx / Sommariva possiede. Courtesy of Walter Padovani, Milan, Italy240 Giovanni Beltrami, The Last Kiss of Romeo and Juliet, after Francesco Hayez, 1824. Rock crystal, 12.7 × 0.7 × 9.2 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Purchase, The Isaacson-Draper Foundation Gift, 2016241 Bartolomeo et Pietro Paoletti, Museo di S. E. il sig. cont. Sommariva, [1822–1834]. Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, collections Jacques Doucet, Ms 808, n. 1–19. Photo credit: Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Paris, France242 Plaster cast after Giovanni Beltrami’s cameo after Pierre-Paul Prud’hon’s Portrait of Count Sommariva in His Villa in Tremezzo. Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, collections Jacques Doucet, Ms 808, no. 1 Photo credit: Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Paris, France243 Francesco Carnesecchi, Impressions of Intaglios after the Statuary of Canova, ca. 1822–1844. Plaster, paper, and leather, 25.4 × 17.1 × 5.6 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Joseph D. Ryle, 1992244 Plaster cast after Giuseppe Girometti’s cameo after Canova’s Penitent Magdalene. Paoletti impronte [realia], Roma S. Paoletti … di studio in Via della Croce, 86, [ca. 1865?], plaster. Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Fund245 Antonio Canova, Terpsichore, 1816. Marble, 177.5 × 78.1 × 61 cm. Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund246 Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (detail), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev250

Acknowledgements This project has spanned well over a decade. Along the way, I have had the good fortune of meeting wonderful colleagues, many of whom have become close friends, and my research and writing has been generously supported by several institutions. I owe a debt to all of them that far exceeds what can be written here. This work originated at Columbia University, where the enthusiasm and intellectual curiosity of my mentors, Anne Higonnet and Jonathan Crary, shaped my love of nineteenth-century art. Anne was the first to encourage me to think seriously about Canova and shift my focus from France to Italy and painting to sculpture; along the way, she not only provided rigorous feedback that improved my scholarship, but invaluable professional advice. Jeffrey Collins, Dominique Poulot, and the late David Rosand all provided thought-provoking and helpful comments on early drafts of the manuscript. Elizabeth Hutchinson was an unwavering advocate during my time in New York. At Columbia, I was fortunate to have met several colleagues who shared my love of sculpture and the nineteenth century, including Heidi Applegate, Emerson Bowyer, Lynn Catterson, Catherine Roach, and Susan Sivard. A fellowship at the American Academy in Rome allowed me to settle in to research in the city’s archives while the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and the Samuel H. Kress Foundation funded fruitful stays in Naples and Venice. In Rome, Jana Dambrogio, Erik Gustafson, John Hopkins, Daniel McReynolds, and Eleanor Rust were eager companions on artistic excursions. Michael Conforti went out of his way to introduce me to the inimitable Hugh Honour, and Daniel Bozhkov helped me imagine Canova’s Venus and Adonis in situ in a drawing I still

cherish. A generous three-year fellowship from the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, funded two additional, marvelous years in Rome and a very productive year in Washington, DC. The intellectual dialogue generated by Elizabeth Cropper and Peter Lukehart at CASVA created a stimulating environment, and Daniella Berman, Janna Israel, and Megan O’Neil were valued interlocutors. A Library Research Grant from the Getty Foundation enabled me to travel to Los Angeles, where I was able to make use of the remarkable materials housed in the Getty Research Institute and the Charles E. Young Library Department of Special Collections at UCLA. Later phases of the project also received substantial support. The Lauro de Bosis Fellowship in the History of Italian Civilization at Harvard University provided me with access to Harvard’s excellent libraries; I owe particular thanks to the Department of History of Art and Architecture for sponsoring my association with the department after the completion of the fellowship and the library staff that continued to provide materials during my maternity leave. My stay in Boston was enriched by the friendship of Lisa Graustein. A Chester Dale Fellowship in the department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts at The Metropolitan Museum of Art allowed me to write the third chapter of the book. Denise Allen’s unparalleled understanding of material and insight into historical and contemporary sculpture installations expanded my considerations of Canova’s display techniques. Luke Syson and Jack Soultanian agreed to light Canova’s hollow Medusa, which remains one of the most spectacular—in all senses of the

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word—engagements I have had with the artist’s work. Daily trips to the museum were a joy, both because of the remarkable collections and the friends I made in Lia Markey, Julia Siemon, and Katherine Wright. I spent three fruitful terms as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Williams College and am grateful to the colleagues who welcomed me into the department and gave me numerous opportunities to share my ideas on Canova. Scarlett Jang lent me her office so I had a serene place to work, and Michael Lewis was a generous co-instructor from whom I learned much about engaging lecturing. Peter Low showed me remarkable kindness during difficult moments. My time in Williamstown was enriched by the friendship of Catherine Howe, Pia Kohler, Jim Elkins, and Margaret MacNamidhe. At Yale University, I am lucky to work with wonderful and supportive colleagues in many departments. I am particularly grateful to the Jonathan Edwards community, including the Fellows, students, and staff, for making JE home to me and my family over the past seven years. It is hard to describe the unusual and all-encompassing role of the residential college dean, and I would not have been able to complete this project without the practical and moral support of my fellow RCDs. Leanna Barlow, Surjit Chandhoke, Angie Gleason, Sarah Insley, Camille Lizarríbar, and Nilakshi Parndigamage all deserve special recognition for their extraordinary friendship and support. Jill Haines keeps the Dean’s Off ice running smoothly and her efficiency and reliability, not to mention good cheer, helped me carve out time to write. Mark Saltzman was a steadfast partner who led the college with good humor and deep care during both joyful and difficult moments. Anne Gunnison at the Yale University Art Gallery generously shared her deep knowledge of object conversation with me. Thanks also goes to the Department of the History of

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Art for assisting me with the distribution of grants and allowing me space to continue to teach and think about sculpture. My research relied on the dedication and perseverance of many library staff, most recently those individuals working in scan and deliver, interlibrary loan, or borrow direct departments that continued to make research possible throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Matthew Boylan, Senior Reference Librarian at the New York Public Library, deserves special recognition for assisting me with the painstaking conversion of nineteenth-century foreign currency to current American dollars. Special thanks go to Maria Antonietta de Angelis for giving me access to the archives of the Vatican Museums. Maria Giovanni Regina Iannotti at the Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli was kind enough to share her research on the Berio family with me. Particularly accommodating were Roberta Mion at the Biblioteca Seminario Patriarcale and Evelina Piera Zanon at the Archivio dell’Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice, both of whom allowed me conduct research on days when the library was not officially open to researchers. I had two very fruitful stays in Bassano del Grappa and am indebted to the library’s director, Giuliana Ericani, and archivist, Renata del Sal, as well as their knowledgeable and friendly librarians. Over the years, I have had the good fortune of presenting my research in fora where the ensuing conversations improved it immensely. Andaleeb Banta, Peter Bell, Sarah Beetham, Amanda Douberley, Noémie Étienne, Maria Gindhart, Anca Lasc, Victoria L. Rovine, Laura Sanders, Melania Savino, Charlotte Schrei­ ter, Jyrki Siukonen, Xavier Solomon, Eva-Maria Troelenberg, Francesca Whitlum-Cooper, and Jon Wood are simply a few of the individuals who enabled these vibrant discussions. Parts of this manuscript previously appeared as journal articles and essays, and I am grateful to those publishers for allowing me to include

Acknowledgements

that material here. Sections of chapter one were published as “Canova and the Writing of Art Criticism in Eighteenth-Century Naples,” Word & Image 30.4 (Oct.–Dec. 2014): 362–376, https://www.tandfonline.com/. Parts of chapter two were published as “Staging Neoclassicism: Antonio Canova’s Exhibition Strategies for Triumphant Perseus,” in Das Originale der Kopie: Kopien als Produkte und Medien der Transformation von Antike, edited by Marcus Baker, Tatjana Bartsch, Horst Bredekamp, and Charlotte Schreiter, 139–163 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010), and parts of chapter three appeared as “The Deceptive Surface: Perception and Sculpture’s ‘Skin’,” Images Re-Vues: Histoire, anthropologie et théorie de l’art 13 (2016), https:// imagesrevues.revues.org/3931. I am deeply indebted to my editor at Amsterdam University Press, Erika Gaffney, who patiently shepherded this project through production and answered innumerable emails throughout. Two anonymous peer reviewers provided comments which significantly improved the book. The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation provided a Scholars’ Publication Subvention to support the subvention and indexing, and the Frederick W. Hilles Publication Fund at the Whitney Humanities Center, Yale University, supported the purchase of high-resolution images and permissions, without which this book would not have taken on its final form. Conversations with close friends and family have often inspired the most productive and enjoyable moments of writing. Heather Nolin has provided support in many ways over the past decade; most recently, she has hosted gatherings of remarkable women which have provided time and space for fruitful discussions. Discussions with Amy Whitaker, Erin Benay, Meredith Fluke, and Christine Filippone propelled me over the finish line. A coterie of friends who have read large portions, in some cases the entirety, of the manuscript deserve my gratitude. Karen

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Lloyd, Carolina Mangone, Jessica Maratsos, Aimee Ng, Heather Nolin, Gregory Waldrop, and Amy Whitaker not only provided constructive feedback but also encouragement and often a much-needed dose of levity. Likewise, Bridget Alsdorf, Ethel Bullitt, Sarah Chang, Susannah Crowder-Sklar, Marie-Stéphanie Delamaire, and Lindsey Schneider all deserve special mention for their long-standing friendship. I am fortunate to have a broad extended family that has generously supported me in many ways throughout the years: Roberta Mantovani Navarro, Paola Mantovani Schuell, and their daughters, Olivia, Julia, Victoria, Sara, and Anna, as well as the extended Patryk family. The Tamarris, Mantovanis, and Aldrovandis made my stay in Italy a literal homecoming and I am grateful my research allowed me to spend so much time with them. I am also grateful to my in-laws, Ceal and Bruce Holden, and my brother-in-law, Matthew Holden, who even dragged suitcases across the Atlantic on my behalf. My immediate family has shown interminable patience with this project and will no doubt breathe a sigh of relief that it is done. I could not ask for a better, smarter, or more loving sister than Elizabeth Ferando. My brother-in-law, Robb Patryk, patiently read a full draft even though art history is not his field of study. Their generosity, expressed in many ways each and every day, is worthy of far greater recognition than I can include here. I would not have taken on the task of writing a book had not my mother, Rosanna Ferando, and my late father, Louis Ferando, placed a high value on education; they fully believed in my capacity to complete whatever I set my mind to—even if they did not always understand my embrace of art history. Most of all, this book would not have been written without the unwavering support of my husband, Jason Atkinson. He has been not only a willing companion on many adventures, but his

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sense of humor, calm demeanor, and keen curiosity provide an excellent model for continued personal growth. We have been through many things together, including sorrow at the early loss of our daughter, Ava, and absolute elation at the birth of our son, Holden. Holden has his

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

father’s curiosity and genuine kindness, and he too has spent many hours wondering when this book would be finished. It is to the two of them, for their patience and the joy they bring into my life, that this book is dedicated.



Introduction: Canova on Display Abstract: The introduction, “Canova on Display,” examines Canova’s dedication to the art of display and his innovative exhibition strategies. Beholders’ responses to these displays are firmly situated both in the Italian context that engendered him and in the international community that celebrated his work. The discourse generated by viewers in response to exhibitions of his works impacted the way works of arts were perceived, fueling reconsiderations of the sculptural medium and its place in cultural patrimony. Keywords: sculpture installations, pedestals, lighting, grand tour, reception theory, art criticism

This is not a book about the making of art. Nor is it concerned with tracing the history of display or locating the origins of aesthetic theories. It is, rather, a consideration of the dynamic relationship between viewers and works of art. By using the work of Antonio Canova (1757–1822) as a linchpin, I explore the way viewing conditions, political turbulence, and familiarity with artistic concepts shaped beholders’ interpretations and judgments of objects. This, in turn, formed their understanding of themselves as beholders and critics. More importantly, however, their discussions shaped the legacy of important sculptural theories, helping usher in their modern definitions and creating the lenses through which we experience and interpret works of art. Beholders’ variable attitudes towards Canova’s work demarcate a transitional moment in the history of art and the establishment of modern attitudes not just towards sculpture, but towards cultural patrimony in general. Canova’s career spanned the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, a period when

the European continent was experiencing considerable turmoil due to revolutionary forces in France and the subsequent establishment—and collapse—of the French empire. Despite the political upheaval within the Italian states and their occupation by foreign sovereigns, Canova was hailed as the greatest artist of the period (Fig. 0.1). His neoclassical creations exemplified the ideals of the ancients and merged a classical aesthetic with a Romantic sensibility, attracting admirers from across the globe. Moreover, upon the sculptures’ completion, Canova and his patrons took care to celebrate the masterful conception and carving of his works in the meticulous orchestration of their display. His sculptures were venerated with dramatic and noteworthy exhibitions that attracted hundreds, if not thousands, of visitors. By enshrining his marble figures alongside plaster casts of ancient works, bathing them in candlelight, staining and waxing their surfaces, and even setting them in motion on rotating bases, Canova engaged viewers intellectually, physically, and emotionally. He delighted their senses even as

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_intro

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Fig. 0.1: Thomas Lawrence, Portrait of the Italian Sculptor Antonio Canova (1757–1822). Oil on canvas, 91 × 71 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

he challenged them to rethink inherited views about the nature of sculpture. By the twentieth century, however, Canova’s neoclassical perfection was invoked only as a foil to modern art, and his dismissal as the “erotic Frigidaire” sounded the death knell to his reputation and the precipitous decline of neoclassicism.1 To blame, in part, is the fact that the modern experience of viewing neoclassical sculpture is vastly different than that of the early nineteenth century. Canova’s sculptures do not 1 Mario Praz, “Canova, or the Erotic Frigidaire,” ARTNews LVI (Nov. 1957): 24–27.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

fare well against the modernist aesthetic of the “white cube.” Gone are the walls with carefully chosen palettes that both cast a warm glow on the white marble and allowed it to stand out against them. Gone, too, are the hidden alcoves and enclosed viewing spaces that lent Canova’s works such mystery. Isolated against bright white walls, it is no surprise more contemporary critics found Canova’s works cold and lifeless. Yet during his lifetime, and, indeed, for many years after his death, Canova’s perfect marmoreal forms inspired passion and vitriol. They provoked debates on a wide range of topics—the nature of sculptural production, the definition of originality, the construction of normative white femininity, the centrality of cultural patrimony and many more. I argue that modern conceptions of sculpture were shaped through the animated response to his work, which was activated by dramatic displays. Although now descriptors of Canova’s work—white, European, gendered, idealized—seem out of touch in a world that privileges very different definitions of sculpture and which has radically different cultural and geopolitical concerns, my research reaffirms the continued relevance of the artist and his work. By examining a wealth of primary sources in English, French, Italian, and German, I put forth a way of thinking about the display conditions which so enlivened Canova’s works and the multifaceted way viewers engaged with them. The display of Canova’s works encouraged viewers to critically examine, inspect, and contemplate his sculptures. Beholders vociferously debated issues that remain central to the study of art history today. What is the nature of artistic production? How does one write eloquently about a work of art? How best should a work be exhibited? How does sculpture shape and reflect cultural norms? Who owns, or should own, a work of art? Can sculpture be a modern art? By considering Canova’s work in depth, I am

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Introduc tion: Canova on Display

able to approach these evolving and resonant questions from the vantage point of one of their earliest and most lasting (if until now not always acknowledged) originators. Canova may not have been original in the way we think of—his neoclassical works are sometimes too redolent of the past—but he was highly original in orchestrating the display and presentation of his work. In this way, he affords us new understanding of the immersive experience of contemporary art and the way it commands the beholder’s attention and their physical and psychological engagement. Beholders were encouraged to take the art of looking at sculpture seriously, and so they did. Their examination of Canova’s works and their wide-ranging and often fierce discussions in letters, travel diaries, newspapers, and journals reveal the key role Canova’s work played in defining and transforming aesthetic theories about sculpture in the early nineteenth century, which continue to have an impact well into the present day. Recent art historical literature has tended to position Canova in relation to northern sculptors such as Bertel Thorvaldsen or situate him in the broader context of European art, often as a complement to the French neoclassical painter Jacques-Louis David. My book redresses these narratives, firmly situating Canova both in the Italian context that engendered him and in the international community that celebrated his work. By emphasizing a transcultural and international approach, I paint a more complex picture of Canova’s importance in artistic, political, and public circles. Beholders’ changing attitudes towards his work demarcate a transitional moment in the history of art that fueled reconsiderations of the sculptural medium and its place in cultural patrimony. These lively debates not only placed Canova’s work at the heart of modern ideas about the production, reception, and aesthetics of sculpture, but they reaffirmed the power of

public dialogue to shape art theory and the canon itself. *** Canova’s popularity can be gauged by the number of commissions he received from a host of international patrons from Europe and as far afield as the United States. Unlike other artistic luminaries from the period—most notably Jacques-Louis David—he successfully negotiated the turbulent political climate of the time, remaining in the good graces of the Papacy, Napoleon and the Bonapartes, the Austrian Hapsburgs, and the subsequent Restoration regime, from the 1790s until his death in 1822. Moreover, many of these artistic commissions translated into important cultural posts. As the Inspector General of the Fine Arts of the Papal States, he modified key installations in the Vatican Museums, such as those of the Museo Pio-Clementino and Galleria Chiaramonti, and set policies regarding cultural patrimony.2 In addition to these cultural roles, Canova also took on political responsibilities—even if he did so hesitantly. After Napoleon’s deposition, the allied European forces descended on Paris to demand the return of their looted works of art. It was Canova whom the Pope sent on this diplomatic mission on behalf of the Papal States, and while in Paris, Canova intervened and bore witness to repatriations not only for the Papal States, but also the Venetian Republic and the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. This cultural and political cachet merely augmented the reputation he had already 2 For Canova’s impact on the cultural patrimony of Italy, see Giancarlo Cunial, “Canova e la tutela degli oggetti d’arte,” in Antonio Canova: Scultura, dipinti e incisioni dal Museo e dalla Gipsoteca di Possagno presentati ad Assisi, ed. Mario Guderzo (Crocetto del Montello, Treviso: Terra Ferma, 2013), 55–73.

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established as a sculptor. Canova was known for his perfectionism. His carving and the special attention he paid to the surface of the marble created the illusion that the stone had been transubstantiated into “real flesh.”3 The softness achieved by Canova’s chisel was heightened by the application of wax and grind water to the marble, which filled in the interstices and unevenness of the stone and created a lush, reflective surface. At times Canova even tinted the cheeks and lips of his female sculptures with rouge. While these techniques were sometimes controversial, they also secured his reputation as the modern Pygmalion and encouraged the brisk market for his work. For those admirers who could not afford a marble sculpture, his work was available via reproductions which ranged from high-end marble copies and luxury engraved gems to (comparatively) inexpensive prints and plaster casts. Travelers could also see many of his sculptures in his studio in Rome, which acted as a showcase of sorts, with large clay models, plaster casts, and marbles in the process of being carved all on display. Canova’s studio was by no means the only place viewers could encounter his works. Original sculptures were on display throughout Europe, in private collections, churches, academies, gardens, public squares, statesponsored exhibitions, and newly founded public museums. These diverse locations make it difficult to speak of a dominant mode for the presentation of works of art in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Yet while there 3 Cited in Antonio Canova and Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Il carteggio Canova-Quatremère de Quincy, 1785–1822, ed. Giuseppe Pavanello and Fran­ cesco Paolo Luiso (Ponzano, Italy: Vianello, 2005), 175. The phrase “vera carne” was used by Canova when admiring the Parthenon marbles and has been used subsequently to describe his own capacity to carve marble. Unless otherwise indicated, all translations are my own.

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is no single resource on the history of display, scholarship by Malcolm Baker, Jeffrey Collins, Gail Feigenbaum, Andrew McClellan, Carole Paul, and others makes use of contemporary details culled from a variety of sources to showcase the period’s diverse exhibition strategies. 4 Sculpture in particular lent itself to a variety of possible installations. The durability of marble and bronze meant works could be displayed outside, while the medium’s three-dimensionality allowed artists and patrons to play with lighting, pedestal heights and types, and viewing angles. Eighteenth-century installations were a far cry from modernism’s white wall. Canova, like other artists of the period, became versed in these possibilities because of his own experience of viewing art. His welldocumented “grand tour” in 1779–1780, in which he viewed objects in the academies, museums, and private collections of all the great Italian centers, influenced his own near-obsession with the exhibition conditions of his sculptures. His patrons quickly picked up on the importance display held for him. While commission and installation details are not always available, in many cases correspondence with his clients 4 For some examples, see Malcolm Baker, Figured in Marble: The Making and Viewing of Eighteenth-Century Sculpture (London: V&A Publications, 2000); Jeffrey Laird Collins, Papacy and Politics in Eighteenth-Century Rome: Pius VI and the Arts (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Gail Feigenbaum and Francesco Freddolini, eds., Display of Art in the Roman Palace, 1550–1750 (Los Angeles: The Getty Research Institute, 2014); Andrew McClellan, Inventing the Louvre: Art, Politics, and the Origins of the Modern Museum in Eighteenth-Century Paris (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994); Carole Paul, The Borghese Collections and the Display of Art in the Age of the Grand Tour (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008); and the essays in Carole Paul, ed., The First Modern Museums of Art: The Birth of an Institution in 18th- and Early-19th-Century Europe (Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).

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Introduc tion: Canova on Display

Fig. 0.2: L. & F., One-half of stereograph showing Canova’s Cupid and Psyche in the Musée du Louvre, 1856–1890. Notice the handle on the base of the sculpture which enables it to turn. Glass, paper, and sealed edge, 8.4 × 17.1 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

signals not just Canova’s interest, but his fixation on the placement of his works. His patrons, in turn, were eager to assure him that his sculptures were well situated and set off to their best advantage. The very nature of the medium, its long production time, the challenges and difficulties of installation meant that Canova was involved—even if indirectly—in the placement of most of the large-scale works

completed during his lifetime. Therefore, while the installations that Canova and his patrons subsequently employed were not created exnovo but were rooted in long-standing display conventions, particularly those of ancient sculptures, the degree to which Canova intervened and influenced them was unparalleled. Countless works, for instance, were placed on pedestals with built in turntables. While there

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 0.3: Anonymous, Canova’s Creugas, Triumphant Perseus, and Damoxenes in situ in the Vatican Museums, 1890–1910. Part of photo album of a journey through Southern Europe and the Middle East. Gelatin silver print, 19 × 24.6 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

were precedents for this in both antiquity and the early modern era, these were rare rather than regular occurrences. In contrast, most of Canova’s works, except the religious sculptures, were placed on rotating bases.5 Small busts, for instance, had handles in their bases that could be used to rotate the work, but large works such as his Cupid and Psyche turned easily as well (Fig. 0.2). Sculptures that were conceived as a pair only rotated one hundred and eighty degrees, to maintain the logic of their relationship

5 See Kristina Herrmann Fiore, “Sulle virtù dinamiche di statue e colossi del Canova,” in Sculture romane del Settecento, II: La professione dello scultore, ed. Elisa Debenedetti (Rome: Bonsignori, 2002), 269–294.

to one another.6 These included the famous boxers, Damoxenos and Creugas, and Hector and Ajax (Fig. 0.3). In addition, works not placed on rotating pedestals were sometimes surrounded by mirrors. These display techniques showcased Canova’s capacity to think in three dimensions. Since he also periodically worked with a trestle that allowed him to rotate both clay and marble works easily in front of him, Canova’s insistence that viewers see his sculptures from all points of view was an extension of his own working process and his own experience with the materiality of marble. Not satisfied with ensuring viewers’ appreciation of all the angles of his work, Canova also 6 Ibid., 277.

Introduc tion: Canova on Display

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Fig. 0.4: Benjamin Zix, The Emperor Napoleon and Empress Marie-Louise Visiting the Laocoön Room in the Louvre by Torchlight, ca. 1804–1811. Pen and ink, 26 × 29 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

insisted on controlling the lighting in which his sculptures were displayed. Viewing sculptures in torchlight, for instance, surged in popularity at the end of the eighteenth century because it was believed that the ancients themselves enjoyed looking at sculpture in this manner.7 Attending the Vatican (and subsequently the Louvre) at night to see the Laocoön and the Apollo Belvedere was a popular pastime, and Canova likewise urged visitors to admire his works out of the undiluted light of day (Fig. 0.4). In other instances, Canova ensured that his sculptures were well lit from above, 7 Oskar Bätschmann, The Artist in the Modern World: The Conflict between Market and Self-Expression (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997), 21–22.

creating apertures in the ceiling above his works. In 1803, he even ordered the niches in the octagonal courtyard of the Museo PioClementino bricked up to control the lighting of Triumphant Perseus and The Boxers and to isolate the beholder from the surrounding sculptures.8 In addition to techniques that guided the viewer’s interaction with the sculpture, Canova was equally preoccupied with the larger 8 Paolo Liverani, “La nascita del Museo Pio-Clementino e la politica canoviana dei Musei Vaticani,” in Canova direttore di musei. I settimana di studi canoviani, ed. Manlio Pastore Stocchi (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2004), 97–98.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

environment. Early in his career Canova applauded the intended placement of Psyche in Girolamo Zulian’s home (Fig. 0.5). Although Zulian died before obtaining the work, Canova felt that the room Zulian and the architect Giannantonio Selva had designed seemed “perfectly suited” for the sculpture. But Canova’s praise did not mean he did not have advice for the architect. On the contrary, he had detailed suggestions for improvement and recommended Selva add a “simple frieze with a chiaroscuro festoon, with a few butterflies, with a simple coffered ceiling and greenish or yellowish walls […], or to paint or tint with stucco some of the coffered panels of the vault. You know a thousand times better than me,” he continued with false modesty, “but I would think all in chiaroscuro.”9 In fact, Canova encouraged collectors to display his sculptures in architectural frames. These were meant to flatter the work, control the lighting, invite contemplation, and encourage—or limit—movement around the sculpture. Numerous works were exhibited in settings constructed or modified specifically for them. Nicolaus II Esterházy commissioned a temple in the park of Esterházy palace, shown here in a painting by Alfred Christoph Dies, that ultimately showcased the seated statue of Princess Leopoldine after its completion in 182210 (Fig. 0.6). The Duke of Bedford famously ensconced The Three Graces in a chapel-like space at Woburn Abbey, and Hercules and Lychas reigned in a similar apsidal alcove in

Fig. 0.5: Antonio Canova, Psyche, 1793–1794. Marble, 150 × 50 × 60 cm; pedestal 80 × 60 cm. Kunsthalle Bremen, Germany. © Kunsthalle Bremen – Lars Lohrisch – ARTOTHEK

9 Cited in Ranieri Varese, “La Psiche seconda: ‘Ed ha un occulto magistero’,” Studi veneziani, N.S. 45 (2003): 309. 10 Géza Galavics, “‘Porträts’ eines fürstlichen Gartens: Der Esterházysche Schloßpark in Eisenstadt,” in “Der Natur und Kunst gewidmet”: Der Esterházysche Schloßpark in Eisenstadt, ed. Franz Prost (Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2001), 126.

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Fig. 0.6: Albert Christoph Dies, The Temple of Leopoldine with Lake, 1807. Oil on canvas, 168 × 217 cm. Private collection, Eisenstadt Castle, Eisenstadt, Austria. Esterházy Privatstiftung, Schloss Eisenstadt, Gemäldesammlung, B 95

the home of the Duke of Torlonia in Rome11 (Figs. 0.7 and 0.8). In Vienna, Canova’s involvement in the placement of his works is evident from correspondence between the artist and the architect Pietro Nobile, who designed a large temple in the Volksgarten to hold Theseus and the Centaur (Figs. 0.9 and 0.10). Not only did Canova recommend Nobile for the job,

but he also weighed in with opinions on the architecture, suggesting, for instance, that the temple be modeled on the Temple of Hephaestus, in Athens, then known as the Theseion and believed to have housed the remains of Theseus himself.12 The same architect had also designed a temple to house the Monument to Maria Christina of Austria in 1803, for which a series of drawings show his

11 See Marco Pupillo, “Appunti sulla sistemazione dell’Ercole e Lica di Antonio Canova,” Bollettino dei musei comunali: Associazione Amici dei Musei di Roma N.S. XXVI (2012): 113–132.

12 Monica Pacorig, “Canova e il tempio di Teseo,” Arte documento 7 (1993): 239–242.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 0.7: Antonio Canova, Three Graces, 1814–1817, in situ at the Duke of Bedford’s Woburn Abbey. From the Woburn Abbey Collection

Fig. 0.8: Pietro Vitali, “The Gallery of Hercules and Lychas in the Palazzo Torlonia,” frontispiece of P. Vitali, Marmi scolpiti esistenti nel palazzo di S.E. il Sig. Gio. Torlonia. Rome: Presso Vitali, [182–?], vol. 2. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (85-B24588)

Introduc tion: Canova on Display

Fig. 0.9: Carl Schmidt, Theseus Temple by Pietro von Nobile in the Volksgarten, Vienna, Perspective, 1820. Graphite, black pen, watercolor, 51.8 × 73.1 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna

Fig. 0.10: Carl Schmidt, Theseus Temple by Pietro von Nobile in the Volksgarten, Vienna, Cross-Section, 1820. Graphite, black pen, pink wash, 71.5 × 52 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna

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unrealized plans13 (Figs. 0.11 and 0.12). Nobile intended the temple to be freestanding, with Doric columns and a domed roof, and accessed from the front, limiting viewers’ perspectives of the monument. Although Prince Albert of Saxony, Duke of Teschen, ultimately was pleased with the placement of the monument in the Augustinian Church in Vienna, he “perhaps did regret” his decision not to place the work in a tempietto.14 As Canova himself wrote unenthusiastically, “the church certainly could not have an extremely favorable light, even if it wasn’t extremely bad, either.”15 At other times, Canova used careful juxtapositions to draw attention to his works’ aesthetic qualities. Before entering the collection of the Museo Pio-Clementino, for instance, Triumphant Perseus was exhibited in Canova’s studio near a plaster cast of the Apollo Belvedere, its model. Likewise, casts of other ancient masterpieces were exhibited both as inspiration and foil to Canova’s own sculptures. A model of Hercules and Lychas was displayed next to a cast of its prototype, the Farnese Hercules. Even the fragments of classical works Canova collected and placed on the outer walls of his studio were organized to show “typological groupings.16 (Fig. 0.13). In Canova’s museological installations, such as his plan for the Braccio Nuovo of the Museo Chiaramonti in the Vatican, objects were also grouped together and installed in 13 Angelika Gause-Reinhold, Das Christinen-Denkmal von Antonio Canova und der Wandel in der Todesauffassung um 1800 (Frankfurt am Main: P. Lang, 1990), 42–45. 14 Cited in Varese, “La Psiche seconda,” 330. 15 Cited in Ricciotti Bratti, Antonio Canova nella sua vita artistica privata (Venice: R. Deputazione, 1917), 375. 16 Maria Elisa Micheli, “Iudicium et Ordo: Antonio Canova and Antiquity,” in The Rediscovery of Antiquity: The Role of the Artist, ed. Jane Fejfer, Tobias FischerHansen, and Annette Rathje (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, University of Copenhagen, 2003), 277.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 0.12: Pietro Nobile, Plan for a Temple for the Maria Christina Monument, Vienna (unrealized), 1803. 27.5 × 14.5 cm. Su concessione della Soprin­ tendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio del Friuli Venezia Giulia, Ministero della Cultura, Fondo Pietro Nobile, vol. 42, no. 11 Fig. 0.11: Pietro Nobile, Plan for a Temple for the Maria Christina Monument, Vienna (unrealized), 1803. 25.5 × 11.5 cm. Su concessione della Soprin­ tendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio del Friuli Venezia Giulia, Ministero della Cultura, Fondo Pietro Nobile, vol. 42, no. 10

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Fig. 0.13: “Canova’s Studio,” L’Album, giornale letterario e di belle arti. Rome: Tipografia delle belle arti, 1835, vol. 2, no. 37 (Saturday, November 21, 1835): 296. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (85-S84)

order to invite comparisons between them.17 It was thus through the display of his work that Canova best expressed his engagement with the sculptural medium and that he and his patrons stage-managed the viewer’s experience. The sensitivity and, at times, anxiety Canova revealed concerning the display of his work has broad implications not only for our understanding of his attitude towards his sculptures and their beholders but also about larger questions of artistic intent and an audience’s capacity to generate a work’s meaning. Canova had his beholders in mind throughout the creative process: in the formulation of his works, in his exploration of sculpture’s three-dimensionality,

in the carving of their surfaces, and in their dramatic display. The central position the beholder held for Canova not only reflects their importance but also the embodied nature of viewing art in the nineteenth century. These are questions that evolved over the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and can also teach us about our engagement with art in this contemporary moment. Canova’s relationship with his beholders has been of great interest recently to art historians and in recent exhibitions, where his works have been displayed on rotating pedestals, with mirrors, and with subdued lighting that mimics torchlight.18 Alex Potts has analyzed some of

17 Maria Antonietta de Angelis, “Il ‘braccio nuovo’ del Museo Chiaramonti: Un prototipo di museo tra passato e futuro,” Bollettino—Monumenti musei e gallerie pontificie 14 (1994): 194–196 and 205–207.

18 As, for instance, in the 2019–2020 exhibition in Milan, Canova: Eterna bellezza. See Giuseppe Pavanello, ed., Canova: Eterna bellezza (Cinisello Balsamo, Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2019).

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these display techniques—particularly the pose and position of Canova’s sculptures as well as their tinted surfaces—with respect to the aesthetic experience of the viewer.19 For Potts, Canova’s flowing sculptural forms work in tandem with these exhibition techniques to force the beholder to circle the work, thus seeing it bit by bit at close range, ultimately undoing the “wholeness” of classical sculpture. This, he argues, points the way forward to modern viewing practices promoted by Rodin and Minimalism. Satish Padiyar likewise draws attention to the process of viewing Canova’s sculptures by emphasizing the sculptural surface and its lustrous “skin.” For him, the modernity of Canova’s works is this “envelope” which becomes the site of subjectivity, transcendence, and collective identity in the postrevolutionary period.20 Padiyar’s analysis depends on Immanuel Kant’s aesthetic philosophy, as does David Bindman’s recent book on the sculptor.21 Bindman positions Canova in relation to the Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen by examining their work in light of neo-Kantian criticism, particularly that of the German author Carl Ludwig Fernow. Focusing on issues of gender, color, and race, Bindman suggests that not only were Canova’s apologists, such as Leopoldo Cicognara and Quatremère de Quincy, also affected by Kant’s philosophies of the autonomous work of art, but that Canova himself also may have altered his sculptural practice in response to (negative) 19 Alex Potts, The Sculptural Imagination: Figurative, Modernist, Minimalist (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000), esp. “Surface Values: Canova,” 38–60. 20 Satish Padiyar, Chains: David, Canova, and the Fall of the Public Hero in Postrevolutionary France (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007), 6. 21 David Bindman, Warm Flesh, Cold Marble: Canova, Thorvaldsen and Their Critics (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014).

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

criticism he received—ultimately indirectly responding to Kant’s aesthetic philosophy. However obliquely engaged Canova himself may have been with Kant’s ideas—for as Padiyar puts it, “Canova is not a reader of Kant”—there is no escaping the influence Kant had on the history of aesthetics and the history of art at the end of the eighteenth century.22 This has most recently been analyzed with great success by Caroline van Eck in a larger study on the changing attitudes towards the reception of sculpture in the late eighteenth century.23 Prior to 1750, sculptures were often treated as animated beings that could evoke an extreme range of emotions, from love to hatred, in viewers. By the late eighteenth century, propelled by the rise of aesthetic philosophy including the dissemination of Kant’s ideas of disinterested judgment, this type of reaction was increasingly considered inappropriate. The formation of ideal “rational, enlightened and autonomous” subjects promoted an aesthetic experience based on the formal properties of the work of art, free from “practical use” and “monetary value,” from idolatry and fetishism, and from “all feelings of love, hate, fear or desire.”24 Moreover in conjunction with the concomitant rise of the art museum, responses to works of art were policed, creating new models for the appreciation of art which had an enormous impact on the history of modernism. As van Eck points out, however, this transition was hardly a clear cut one and “pre-modern” engagement with the art object continued—and continues—to linger. 22 Padiyar, Chains, 136. Canova did own two editions, in German, of Kant’s Critic of Pure Reason. See Giuseppe Pavanello, La biblioteca di Antonio Canova (Verona: Cierre, 2007), 68, nos. 1254–1255. 23 Caroline van Eck, Art, Agency and Living Presence: From the Animated Image to the Excessive Object (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015). 24 Ibid., 132.

Introduc tion: Canova on Display

Indeed, Sarah Betzer has recently suggested that the heightened attention on Kant’s theories of disinterestedness was in part a response to “a new alertness of the ‘subjective self’” and an “affective” aesthetic response that was particularly stimulated by sculpture.25 This was a transitional moment in the history of art when models of looking and possibilities for the aesthetic experience were in flux. Everything about Canova’s works—his alternatively sensual and violent subjects, his surface values, the display conditions of his works—all reiterate his complicated relationship to the Kantian legacy. The interaction Canova’s viewers had with his sculptures showcases the limits of Kant’s model of aesthetic judgment free of desire; there is inevitable tension between idealized theory and its application in a politically and socially charged world. Moreover, Canova’s works—and particularly the display of them—undermined Kant’s requirement of disinterestedness. It is true that Canova’s display techniques often elicited aesthetic judgment on his sculptures. They required viewers to critically assess his works by testing different skills. The installations were meant to educate viewers’ vision and their judgment in numerous ways. The sculptor wanted viewers to admire his careful conception of subjects, to understand his selection of iconographic details, and to appreciate his talent as a carver. At the same time, however, the singular and dedicated manner in which beholders paid heed to his works—turning them on pedestals, approaching them closely, admiring them in torchlight, stroking their marble surfaces—encouraged a physical encounter with the work of art that superseded formal admiration. Beholders could not help but be conscious of their own physical, 25 Sarah Betzer, Animating the Antique: Sculptural Encounter in the Age of Aesthetic Theory (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2021), 16.

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carnal nature, and this, in combination with the political undercurrents brought out by the exhibitions, denied any possibility of detachment on their behalf. What is common to both Kant and Canova, then, and what dominates the period around 1800, is the emphasis on the part of artists and philosophers alike on the role of the beholder.26 Broad cultural transformations in the eighteenth century contributed to a shift in viewing conditions for works of art. The new circulation of visitors throughout Europe, as the Grand Tour reached its peak, the abundance of archaeological excavations that supplied hundreds, if not thousands, of new works for sale, and the movement of works of art themselves as part of the art market and military conquest meant that viewers from far beyond the Italian peninsula could see objects directly on a scale as never before. Physical encounters with objects—especially large sculptures—which had once been limited to a rarified audience, or which were experienced via reproductions as plaster casts and prints, were increasingly part of the common experience of works of art. Louis Simond, a Frenchman who traveled through Italy in 1817–1818, said it best: “In this travelling age, all the world has seen the Belvedere Apollo and the Belvedere Apollo has seen all the world.”27

26 Mark Cheetham points out that one of the criticisms against Kant by his contemporaries was that he thought of art from the point of view of the spectator and not the creator. Mark A. Cheetham, Kant, Art, and Art History: Moments of Discipline (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 7. 27 See Louis Simond, A Tour in Italy and Sicily (London: Printed for Longman, Reese, Orme, Brown, and Green, 1828), 219. Simond’s journal was first published in French. This citation is from the English translation. I refer to both versions throughout the book because the differences between them are enlightening.

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Of course, viewers encountered original works of art before the eighteenth century; this relationship between object and beholder has always been integral to the experience of works of art, and artists and writers, philosophers and critics, have always been conscious of their audience. But the period around 1800 is unique because the wide array of spaces in which viewing art took place coincided with and encouraged an exponential growth in the audience. Concrete figures are scarce, but even a quick look at the rising number of visitors to art exhibitions and museums over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries gives a sense of the increasing number of individuals interested in the fine arts. Those of the large urban centers of London and Paris are better known—and more easily explicable by the population growth in those cities themselves. By the 1820s, the congested conditions of the Royal Academy, the National Gallery in London, the Parisian Salon, and the Louvre were regularly lampooned by caricaturists. But such numbers were not limited to northern European capitals. Scholars working on the Capitoline and PioClementino suggest that the museums were “well attended” in the early nineteenth century, and the strict guidelines laid out for custodians regarding proper visitor behavior hint at crowds that needed to be policed.28 By all accounts, visitors flocked to Canova’s sculptures in droves. European and American travel diaries and both public and private journals teem with references to his sculptures. A stop at Canova’s studio in Rome, for instance, was practically de rigueur. While 28 Many thanks to Carole Paul for sharing her reflections on the attendance of the museums in Rome. For more on policing museum crowds, see Tony Bennett, “The Exhibitionary Complex,” in Thinking about Exhibitions, ed. Reesa Breenberg, Bruce W. Ferguson, and Sandy Nairne (London: Routledge, 1996), 81–111.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

other sculptors’ studios in Rome were also open to the public, many of these artists primarily sold newly restored antiquities, copies after ancient sculptures, and plaster casts; they did not have the same allure as an artist making original, modern works in marble. Enticed by the “contemporary art world,” as it then was, the individuals who saw Canova’s work were varied, and included men and women, Italians and foreigners, artists, connoisseurs, critics, statesmen, educated members of the middle and upper classes, and even members of the working class. Canova understood the important role these visitors had in his success. He carefully cultivated public interest in his work. He had, to quote the travel writer and novelist Charlotte Eaton, “the avarice of fame, not of money.”29 Although his f inancial gain was directly linked to his success, Canova did seem genuinely concerned with the critical reaction to his sculptures. Upon unveiling his Venus Italica in the Galleria degli Uffizi of Florence, for instance, he noted that he received the poetry written in his honor with some skepticism; it was the “incorruptible judgment of the public” that he trusted the most.30 More and more viewers understood the power that they had in shaping critical responses to works of art. In the introduction to his letters on his travels around the Continent, Henry Milton, a British War Office clerk sent to Paris to describe the Louvre for the British public, wrote: Works of art may be viewed with reference to the means by which they are produced, or to 29 Charlotte A. Eaton, Rome, in the Nineteenth Century; Containing a Complete Account of the Ruins of the Ancient City, the Remains of the Middle Ages, and the Monuments of Modern Times, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, 1820), vol. 2, 368. 30 Canova and Quatremère de Quincy, Il Carteggio Canova-Quatremère de Quincy, 153.

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For Milton, works were not meant to be evaluated only by their technical accuracy—their production values, so to speak. Specialized knowledge about the making of art might be restricted to artists, but once the work was “given to the world” anyone could weigh in with an opinion, and that opinion need not be limited to technique. Since everyone had the “right to judge,” debates about the success and failure of works of art were no longer limited to artists and connoisseurs but were part of a much broader public dialogue. Although the general composition of the audience (European and American, primarily middle- to upper-class, white, and literate) meant this was not fully a democratic or egalitarian endeavor, it nonetheless meant art criticism was no longer circumscribed to a narrow circle of authors. Discourse—communal discourse—signif icantly impacted the way works of arts were perceived. The expansion of the number and types of individuals who could shape popular opinion on a wide variety of artistic issues created a broad shift in power

dynamics over the course of the nineteenth century; beholders had more and more authority. Importantly, it was a conversation that was occurring in print. These beholders, who felt that their responses and reactions to works of art were as valid as those who once had specialized knowledge, felt equally empowered to publish their opinions. In a period that also saw the expansion of the press, this sometimes took the form of journal articles and essays. At other times, writers took advantage of the epistolary form commonly used by Grand Tourists and published details about their voyages, as had Henry Milton. While travel journals have a long history and have their own idiosyncrasies of form and content, by the early nineteenth century, the sheer number of publications, at least, had grown exponentially.32 This was accompanied by a shift in content. While seventeenth- and eighteenth-century authors had sometimes done little more than list the works of art they saw or had fallen back on the excuse that a work was either “indescribable” or so wellknown not to merit additional commentary, early-nineteenth-century authors were much more voluble. The profusion of literary reviews meant that criticism of their ideas, sometimes accompanied by large citations of the original text, were disseminated widely and at times even translated into foreign languages. Authors might also refer to, agree with, or contradict earlier authors in their own publications, creating a ripple effect which expanded the number of people engaged in the conversation. Everyone really was a critic. It is the literature produced by this new culture of criticism that forms a core focus of this study. The belabored and lengthy process of working in

31 Henry Milton, Letters on the Fine Arts, Written from Paris, in the Year 1815 (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown), v–vi.

32 For common tropes in travel writing, see Chloe Chard, Pleasure and Guilt on the Grand Tour: Travel Writing and Imaginative Geography, 1600–1830 (New York: Manchester University Press, 1999).

the effect resulting from those means. It is the exclusive privilege of the artist to speak on the former subject; but on the latter, those who do not possess practical skill may be competent to judge. The labours of the sculptor, the painter, and the architect, would fail of success if they were only addressed to the artist. They are given to the world; and hence all will assume to themselves a right to judge and discuss their merits: nor can any production be considered as successful, which gains only the applause of those who view it with reference to the difficulty of its execution, and the accuracy of its parts.31

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marble stymied even the most cultured viewers who did not necessarily understand the nuances of the technical process. Liberated from the need to discuss those processes and free to comment instead on a work’s “effect,” as Milton put it, opened a whole range of interpretations of Canova’s works. Christopher Johns has written eloquently about how the form of Canova’s works themselves was open to multiple allegorical and political readings—a fluidity which largely accounted for his ability to remain in favor throughout a variety of political regimes.33 I argue that it was not just the form of Canova’s sculptures that encouraged these multiple readings. Exhibition conditions were also key to their shifting meanings. The display of Canova’s sculptures acted as a catalyst for discourse across a broad range of subjects. Exhibitions of his works inspired discussions of topics as diverse as audience experience, originality and artistic production, the association between the sculptural surface, flesh, and anatomy, the relationship between painting and sculpture, and the role of public museums—all of which remain central to the production and experience of art today. I resurrect these debates here. To understand the breadth and significance of responses to Canova’s work, I engage with reception theory, which focuses not only on the historical context of the work’s first reception, but also its changing context.34 This “historical unfolding” promotes an evolutionary approach to reception that recognizes the significance of a work at a particular moment and within the broader 33 See Christopher M. S. Johns, Antonio Canova and the Politics of Patronage in Revolutionary and Napoleonic Europe (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998). 34 Wolfgang Kemp, “The Work of Art and Its Beholder: The Methodology of the Aesthetic of Reception,” in The Subjects of Art History: Historical Objects in Contemporary Perspectives, ed. Mark A. Cheetham, Michael Ann Holly and Keith Moxey (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 180–196.

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scope of the history of the field, in this case, the history of art.35 But reception theory does not deny the authorial presence; instead, it views production and reception as a dialectical process.36 By allowing the primary sources to speak for themselves, I emphasize not only Canova’s motivations, but also the changes in attitude towards his sculptures that emerge in the fifty years following their production. This changing discourse not only affects our understanding of Canova’s reputation, but also the history of sculpture itself. Over the course of my research, I have been struck by the coherent responses triggered by individual works at key moments in Canova’s career. That unity, in which commentators returned repeatedly to one or two issues, was often prompted by the sculpture’s display. By bringing together visual evidence with numerous textual citations, I trace five key exhibitions of Canova’s work in five major European cen­ ters: Naples, Rome, Florence, Venice, and Paris, spanning the period from 1780 to 1850. One of the great challenges of the book has been dealing with the period’s political and social fragmentation. Eighteenth-century Italy was not a unified nation-state. The peninsula was divided into many independent political entities which had different cultural habits, artistic traditions, and even linguistic dialects. Then in 1796, the invasions of the French set off a series of occupations, regime changes, conflicts, and border disputes that kept Italy and all of Europe in unrest for twenty years. Each of the exhibitions I examine not only plays a central role in determining the aesthetic response to Canova’s work but also reflects the political vagaries of the period; Canova’s works were 35 Hans Robert Jauss, Toward an Aesthetic of Reception, trans. Timothy Bahti (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1982), 32. 36 Ibid., 15.

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Introduc tion: Canova on Display

easily co-opted into political narratives and discussions about cultural patrimony. I have focused on four Italian cities because Italy was the center of origin for many aspects of Canova’s stagings. It was in Italy, with its profusion of ancient sculpture and Renaissance masterpieces, where viewers in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries contemplated, discussed, and engaged with sculpture on an unprecedented scale. It was also the center for artistic instruction in Europe, and no other place attracted so many young, enthusiastic, and talented artists who hoped to absorb the lessons of the ancients while also making a name for themselves. Sculpture and artistic theories about sculpture—its creation, its relationship to painting, its expressive capacity—had a long and preeminent history on the peninsula. Viewers of Canova’s work situated the sculptor not only in relation to artists from antiquity, such as Phidias and Praxiteles, but, more importantly, Michelangelo, Bernini, and even the painter Titian. Despite recent scholarship which has positioned Canova as a foil to Thorvaldsen and Northern artistic traditions, I stress the importance Italian conventions had in shaping the reception of his work.37 The ability of Canova’s work to elicit such debate secured his position within an elevated genealogy of sculptors and artists, creating a distinguished artistic legacy for the sculptor at a moment when the Italian peninsula was in a state of artistic and political decline. Moreover, it showcases the way Italian art theory entered the hands of the public. Theoretical conversations about sculpture—once part of a more restricted dialogue between artists and critics—entered a broader public discussion about art. 37 In addition to Potts and Bindman, see Stefano Grandesso and Fernando Mazzocca, eds., Canova Thorvaldsen: La nascita della scultura moderna (Milan: Skira, 2019).

Yet this attachment to the past was at odds with changing ideas about the role of art, its production, and its reception. Attitudes towards Canova’s work in the seventy-year span I examine reflect not only his slow decline from the greatest artist of the period to the cold sculptor of neoclassicism, but also the fading hegemony of Italy itself. While Canova initially seemed to offer the promise of cultural rehabilitation, in the end, that promise went unfulfilled. In a shift that had begun a century earlier, the peninsula was no longer the center of artistic production or intellectual discourse; that distinction now belonged to Paris. Indeed, it was in Paris where the understanding of Canova’s work as affective and expressive established a modern, forwardlooking path for sculpture.38 *** The book is arranged chronologically and regionally, beginning in late-eighteenth-century Italy and ending in Paris in 1850. Chapter one, “Imagining Sculptural Practice,” centers on the 1795 exhibition of Canova’s Venus and Adonis in Naples. Naples has generally received short shrift in English scholarship, but as the third largest city in Europe at the time, a major archaeological center, and thriving community of artists and literati, it too played an important role in the reception of Canova’s work. Venus and Adonis was displayed in a tempietto in the garden of Francesco Maria Berio, Marchese di Salza, and the group launched a citywide 38 I have omitted London because the British had their own strong tradition of sculpture, and there are numerous scholars ably examining Canova’s work and his British patrons. Since, however, so many of the journals and diaries I examine were written by British travelers, we do get a sense of changing attitudes towards Canova and the impact that Italian art theory had on British artists, critics, and the public.

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debate regarding modes of artistic production and the best means of communicating those artistic possibilities to an audience. Using Canova’s statue as a jumping off point, writers imagined Canova’s working process in detail, from its conceptual origins (“invenzione” or “invention”) to the f inal carving of the piece (“esecuzione,” or “execution”). Anchoring the sculptural process on these two poles not only simplif ied the real labor that went into sculptural production, but it also established two opposing means by which to describe and communicate the sculptor’s labor to a broader audience. Which of these two descriptions was the most effective, however, subsequently became the subject of heated debate, as writers argued not only about the way Canova himself approached the act of sculpting, but, more importantly, about the relationship between art and writing. Unlike Naples, Rome was the uncontested center of artistic training in the eighteenth century. Artists vied to establish their reputation in relation to the city’s ancient and Renaissance works. Chapter two, “Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns,” focuses on Canova’s attempt to cement his legacy through the display of his Triumphant Perseus in relation to the Apollo Belvedere. Although this comparison was meant to highlight Canova’s innovative “imitation” of antiquity, Canova soon lost control over the way his work was perceived by beholders. The changing political circumstances of the period, the different locations in which this comparison took place, and the fact that the Apollo was pres­ ent only as a plaster cast for much of the period when the original sculpture was in Paris not only resulted in shifting opinions about Perseus but also contributed to a change in attitude towards imitation in artistic practice. Once considered a fundamental and generative part of the creative process, imitation took on increasingly negative connotations as mere copying.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Chapter three, “Anatomizing the Female Nude,” continues to explore the themes of imitation and cultural patrimony by focusing on Canova’s 1812 Venus Italica, which was celebrated as the replacement for the Venus de’Medici after the latter was sent to Paris. For the four years that Canova’s Venus Italica was installed in the Tribuna in the Uffizi, she reaffirmed the sculptor’s status as the greatest artist of the age and became a symbol of national pride for occupied Florence. After the Venus de’Medici returned to Florence, however, the Venus Italica was moved to the Palazzo Pitti. There, displayed in a “boudoir” surrounded by mirrors, visitors focused on the softness (“morbidezza”) of her flesh. Although softness was valued in the seventeenth century by admirers of Bernini’s seductive sculptures, the concomitant discourse of desire and seduction was mitigated by Canova’s viewers; they transformed their captivation with the Venus Italica’s sensual flesh into anatomical inquiry. The predilection for “scientific” examination not only reflected the period’s conservative social mores but reveals how sculpture was implicated in the construction of racial and gender hierarchies. Sculpture’s capacity to imitate flesh remained a central concern in the 1817 exhibition of Canova’s Polinnia in the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice, which is the focus of chapter four, “Challenging the Supremacy of Painting.” There, Leopoldo Cicognara, one of the most prominent theoreticians and critics of the period, exploited his position as the director of the Accademia to enforce what might be called a new curatorial focus. In the newly opened public painting gallery, he exhibited Canova’s Polinnia with recently restored Venetian Old Master paintings, including Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin. In the confrontation between these two Venetian masters, who both excelled at the depiction of flesh, Cicognara constructed a clear, understandable narrative for a diverse

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Introduc tion: Canova on Display

audience that merged politics and aesthetics. He literally enacted the paragone, or competition between painting and sculpture, to reaffirm the Veneto’s artistic authority in a moment of political decline. Finally, chapter five, “Defining Modern Sculpture,” shifts to Paris, signaling the moment when Italy became peripheral in sculptural theory and practice. It was there, in the French capital, where Canova’s Penitent Magdalene launched a discussion about “expression” and the emotional resonance of art. Exhibited f irst in the 1808 Salon and subsequently in an intimate space in the townhouse of Giambattista Sommariva, Magdalene’s emotional despair encouraged visitors to reflect on their own sentiments as they gazed upon her. This self-reflection on the part of beholders had numerous consequences. It reinforced notions of individuality and the self and established Canova’s Magdalene as a particularly French and modern work. Equally important, it also forged a direct link between emotional resonance and aesthetic value. This interpretation, I argue, ultimately had the greatest impact on the history of sculpture. In Paris, the focus on expression established a universal model by which sculpture could be appreciated, one that did not rely on sculptural theory, however central to public discourse that theory had become, but rather relied upon more

accessible conceptions of empathy and lived human experience. *** Canova’s works held a keystone position in the larger art world of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Canova and his patrons’ display techniques called attention to the highly dramatized nature of his sculptural process and demanded the active participation of his beholders; moreover, these displays kept him at the center of debates in aesthetic theory, politics, and cultural patrimony. By reflecting on the political, social, and formal signif icance of Canova’s work, by showcasing their connoisseurship skills and familiarity with aesthetic theory, by publishing their reflections and bringing other authors into the conversation, beholders’ engagement with Canova’s sculptures revealed the collaborative, communal nature of looking at art in the early nineteenth century. Discussion about sculpture entered a broad public dialogue and set the stage for contemporary attitudes towards the medium and the experience of viewing art in general. In this pivotal moment in history and in the history of art, reactions to Canova and his work make evident his position as a fulcrum between the early modern and modern period.

1.

Imagining Sculptural Practice Abstract: Chapter one, “Imagining Sculptural Practice,” centers on the 1795 exhibition of Canova’s Venus and Adonis in Naples. The sculpture was displayed in a small temple in the garden of Francesco Maria Berio, Marchese di Salza, and the group launched a citywide debate regarding modes of artistic production. Using Canova’s statue as a jumping off point, writers imagined Canova’s working process in detail, from its conceptual origins (“invenzione” or “invention”) to the final carving of the piece (“esecuzione,” or “execution”). Critics not only argued about Canova’s approach to the act of sculpting, but, more importantly, about how best to describe and communicate the sculptor’s process to a broad audience. Keywords: sculptural production, invention, execution, Naples, Venus and Adonis, ekphrasis

By 1795, when Canova’s Venus and Adonis was unveiled in Naples in the garden of the Palazzo Berio, Canova’s reputation was well established. He had already been a fixture in Rome since 1781, when he opened his first studio in the city center, and his Theseus and the Minotaur, of the following year, was said to have ushered in a new style of art. Prominent papal commissions, such as the funerary monument to Clement XIV in Santa Apostoli in Rome (1783–1787) and the recently completed monument to Clement XIII in St. Peter’s (1792) further enhanced his reputation. Yet Venus and Adonis was one of the first significant, independent, secular groups Canova made for a private patron that was exhibited to great public acclaim. The sculpture received the expected éclat and then some, for Naples’ role as a destination on the Grand Tour and the sculpture’s evocative setting in the garden of a prominent nobleman’s palazzo attracted tourists from all over the continent. Interest in the sculpture was further heightened by a

debate about the sculpture’s creation that raged in the Neapolitan press for well over a year. In what follows, I trace the way this nexus of viewing, reading, and writing about art allowed beholders to grapple with the question of what constituted the creative process—particularly with regards to sculptural production—at the end of the eighteenth century. These discussions not only reflect changing notions on the relationship between ideation and creation but also reveal how the dissemination of literature and criticism played a critical role in the public’s understanding of a work of art.

Art as a Political Tool At the end of the eighteenth century, Naples was experiencing a “golden age.”1 Teeming with 1 The Golden Age of Naples: Art and Civilization under the Bourbons, 1734–1805, 2 vols. (Detroit and Chicago:

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_ch01

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

400,000 inhabitants, it was the third-largest city in Europe after London and Paris. A strange mix of antiquity and modernity, mediated by a sublime, dramatic, and sometimes devastating natural landscape, distinguished Naples’ magnetic and spectacular appeal; it had a dynamic relationship to the past. The discovery of Herculaneum and Pompeii in 1738 and 1748, respectively, animated the city, for the excavations transformed the conception of antiquity from dry, dusty ruins to lived history, endowing contemporary Neapolitans’ daily life with greater significance.2 Naples also had a rich artistic heritage. The seventeenth-century tradition of great Baroque painting was replaced in the eighteenth century by achievements in architecture, garden design, and decorative arts. Political changes in the eighteenth century, prompted by Naples’ transformation into an autonomous kingdom ruled by the Bourbons in 1734, fostered these arts. As the Bourbons consolidated power, they built new streets and avenues, new palaces—most notably, Caserta—and even invested in a new porcelain factory, Capodimonte. The centralization of power in the city prompted the arrival of Neapolitan nobles from the outer provinces. Following the example of the Bourbons and further induced by eighteenth-century laws requiring proof of nobility, these aristocrats relied on conspicuous consumption, particularly

the patronage of the fine arts, to cement their status.3 Confronted by political and cultural transformations, the Berio family was likewise entangled in these social pressures. The family was of Genovese origin and had moved to Naples in the early eighteenth century. They rose to power through their mercantile activities and their success as grain merchants, acquiring so much wealth that by the 1760s they were able to purchase the feudal lands of Salza and the title of marquis.4 Giovan Domenico Berio (1732–1791) became the f irst Marchese di Salza, and his son and Canova’s patron, Francesco Maria Berio (1765–1820; henceforth Berio), became the second marquis upon Giovan Domenico’s death. Berio continued to expand his family’s business activities, and both men invested heavily in establishing the family’s cultural authority as well. Giovan Domenico built a grand palace in the center of the city that he filled with a large collection of works of art. A poet himself, the elder Berio passed his passion for the arts on to his son. Berio was already a prominent figure and promoter of the arts in Naples by the time his father died in 1791 and he assumed the title of marquis. The precise date of his commission of Venus and Adonis is not known and may be as early as 17895 (Fig. 1.1). It was not the only Canova he owned, for Berio also possessed two

Detroit Institute of Arts and the Art Institute of Chicago, 1981). For Canova’s engagement with the city, see the essays in Giuseppe Pavanello, ed., Canova e l’antico (Milan: Electa, 2019). 2 This living history was exemplified by the Museo Ercolanese’s recreation of an ancient kitchen excavated at Pompeii, one of the first examples of a “period room.” See Arturo Fittipaldi, “Museums, Safeguarding and Artistic Heritage in Naples in the Eighteenth Century: Some Reflections,” Journal of the History of Collections, 19.2 (2007): 197.

3 See Anna Maria Rao, “Antiche storie e autentiche scritture. Prove di nobiltà a Napoli nel Settecento,” in Signori, patrizi, cavalieri in Italia centro-meridoniale nell’età moderna, ed. Maria Antonietta Visceglia (Bari: Gius. Laterza e Figli, 1992), 279–308. 4 See Maria Giovanni Regina Iannotti, “Francesco Maria Berio: Mercante, barone, letterato,” (PhD diss., Scuola di perfezionamento per bibliotecari e archivisti, Università degli studi di Napoli, 1989–1990). 5 See “Abbozzo di biografia (1804–1805),” in Scritti, ed. Hugh Honour and Paolo Mariuz (Rome: Salerno, 2007), 347.

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plaster casts of Canova’s Amorino [Cupid] and Psyche, as well as five clay bas-reliefs.6 Venus and Adonis, however, was the only marble group by the artist in his collection and in Naples. Berio’s possession of a marble sculpture from one of Italy’s best-known artists reinforced his position in Naples’ cultural hierarchy as patron and artist became linked in the popular imagination. Certainly Berio was willing to pay a high price for this social stamp, for in a letter to Giannantonio Selva, dated March 14, 1795, Canova bragged, “[I]f you want an idea from other works how I am paid, you should know the Marchese Berio of Naples paid me 2,000 zecchini [roughly $48,000 in today’s dollars] for a statue with two life-size figures.”7 With the confidence required for self-promotion, Canova suggested that even at such a steep price, Berio was getting a deal—“he always thanks me for having wanted to make the work for that price.”8 After its completion and display in Naples in March 1795, the sculpture was used as a political tool not just by Berio, but by the monarchy as well. Public journals immediately hailed the work as an honor to the city, one that signaled Naples’ thriving artistic culture. More importantly, this cultural regeneration was supported by the Neapolitan government. Berio had capitalized on Canova’s fame by requesting that King Ferdinand IV waive the import taxes on the work. The King agreed, and this generous gesture was eagerly reported in Neapolitan and European newspapers and journals, including German, French, Dutch, and 6 See Paola Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli: Tra collezionismo e mercato (Naples: Paparo, 2002), 56–59. 7 Cited in Ranieri Varese, “La Psiche seconda: ‘Ed ha un occulto magistero’,” Studi veneziani, N.S. 45 (2003): 319. With many thanks to Matthew J. Boylan, the Senior Reference Librarian at the New York Public Library, who helped me determine the value of 2,000 zecchini in today’s currency. 8 Varese, “La Psiche seconda,” 319.

Fig. 1.1: Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis, ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Bettina Jacot-Descombes

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English publications.9 Neapolitan newspapers celebrated the King’s decision to “make an exception to the rules” because of “the excellence of [Canova’s] work, which emulates the most renowned works that give the Greek sculptors such honor.”10 Marchese Berio was himself hailed for the generosity with which he “gave this capital a new renowned ornament, and gave the students of the fine arts a perfect model,” recalling the city’s artistic academies and continued production of fine art.11 These accounts signal the enthusiasm with which this commission was heralded in Naples and reiterate the way the work was used to elevate the city’s cultural profile. Naples had a privileged relationship to ancient art due to its proximity to Pompeii and Herculaneum, but the arrival of Canova’s group allowed the city to claim preeminence in the field of modern art as well. At the same time, these reports reflected the way both aristocratic and royal patronage were announced to the burgeoning middle classes through new forms of journalism. They remind us that written texts were fundamental to the way Canova’s works were publicized throughout his career. 9 See Serafino Petroncelli, “Napoli. Sovrana determinazione a favore delle belle arti. Al sig. D. Vincenzo Pecorari,” Giornale letterario di Napoli per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi XXXIII (August 15, 1795): 101; “Literarische Nachrichten. I. Ita­ liänische Literatur,” Intelligenzblatt der Allgemeinen Literatur-Zeitung vom Jahre 1796 86 (6 July 1796): 726; “Sur l’état actuel de la littérature italienne,” Magasin encyclopédique, ou journal des sciences des lettres et des arts 2nd année, tome IV (1796): 52; “Italiaansche Letterkunde. Eerste Beschouwing,” Niewe Algemene Konst-en Letter-Bode voor meer en min Geöffenden 138 (August 19, 1796): 61; and “Present State of Literature in Italy,” Monthly Magazine and British Register 3, no. XVI (April 1797): 270. 10 Petroncelli, “Napoli. Sovrana determinazione,” 101. 11 Ibid.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Sculpture, Eroticism, and the Senses The promotion of Canova’s sculpture was not limited to its announcement in public journals. Guidebooks and travel diaries celebrated Marchese Berio’s installation of the work in the garden of his palazzo, which he opened, free of charge, to the public.12 The resulting display brought streams of visitors to Berio’s gates. Although Canova suggested that “people made great allowances for the work,” his modesty was belied by the public’s dramatic and enthusiastic reception.13 The King himself also went to see the work for which he had so graciously waived taxes, as did numerous Italians and foreigners. Ranieri de’Calzabigi, for instance, an Italian poet and librettist, wanted to see the work immediately once it arrived in Naples in March, but due to his advanced age—he had turned eighty in the fall—he was forced to wait for warmer weather. He noted with great acrimony in a letter to Canova, “I am in Athens, and I cannot see the Minerva of Phidias. Judge for yourself my bitterness.”14 Giuseppe Lucchesi Palli, the Neapolitan collector, and William Hamilton, the British ambassador to Naples, were more fortunate, being among the first admitted to Berio’s garden. Hamilton praised the work in a letter to Canova, calling it a “masterpiece,” and admitted he found it difficult to tear himself 12 Mariana Starke, Travels in Italy, between the Years 1792 and 1798; Containing a View of the Late Revolutions in That Country, 2 vols. (London: Phillips, 1802), vol. 2, 89–90. Many other guidebooks mention the sculpture as well. 13 Canova to D. Marco Martinelli, January 10, 1795, in Per le nozze Treves-Todros. Sei lettere inedite di Antonio Canova (Venice: Tommaso Fontana, 1844), n.p., letter VI. 14 Flavio Tariffi, “1790–1795: Ranieri Calzabigi: Corrispondente napoletano di Antonio Canova,” Studi italiani 3.1 (1991): 144.

Imagining Sculptural Prac tice

away from the temple “in which it was so well situated.”15 Luigia Giuli, Canova’s housekeeper, even noted that the work moved viewers to emotional ecstasy. In a letter to the architect Giannantonio Selva dated March 21, 1795, she informed him that: Neapolitans are processing to see the work. So many people have gathered that many people shout, “Long live Monsieur Berio and long live the artist.” That which surprises me the most is that the best artists from Naples have been seen crying while observing the beauty of the work, and so many accolades have been written to me that it would be too much to recount them all.16

Hordes of visitors f inally forced Berio to limit access to the tempietto for a brief period in April 1795, and travelers continued to visit Berio’s palazzo until the mid-1820s, several years after the sculpture had been sold.17 The “beauty of the work,” as Giuli states, was due not only to the handling of the marble, but also to Canova’s choice of subject. Canova, like many other visual artists, had an intense relationship with the written word. It is well known that assistants often read classical literature out loud to him as he worked, and in seeking out his subjects he often drew upon those same sources.18 The tale of Venus and Adonis, popularized by Ovid’s Metamorphoses, 15 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 150. 16 Cited in A. Segarizzi, “La Biblioteca Querini Stampalia nel sessennio 1910–1915,” L’Ateneo veneto Anno XXXVIII, vol. 2, fasc. 1 (July–August 1915): 202. 17 Canova wrote to Giovanni Falier, April 3, 1795, to report that Berio had had to limit access to the tempietto. Cited in Mario Praz and Giuseppe Pavanello, L’opera completa del Canova (Milan: Rizzoli, 1976), 98. 18 Hugh Honour, “Canova’s Studio Practice I: The Early Years,” The Burlington Magazine 114.828 (March 1972): 148.

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was one of the many stories recounted by the classical author that inspired artists in early modern Italy. According to the story as it is told in Ovid, Cupid accidentally pricks his mother with a golden arrow, and Venus falls passionately in love with the youthful and beautiful Adonis. The two recline together in a shady wood and Venus recounts the tale of Atalanta and Hippomenes, who were transformed into lions for desecrating a sanctuary by their lovemaking. As she relays the portentous tale, interspersing her story with kisses, she cautions Adonis to be wary of wild creatures and large prey. He does not heed her warning, and soon after leaving her, he is gored by an angry boar. As Adonis dies in her arms, Venus sprinkles his blood on the ground, creating the beautiful but fragile flower, the anemone—a detail which makes Canova’s sculpture’s presentation in a garden even more moving. The doomed romance gave Canova the opportunity to “vent himself on the nude” and to render in marble a subject that was already immensely popular in painting.19 Rubens, Titian and Veronese, to name only three examples, had all depicted the lovers’ good-bye and reveled in the story’s eroticism (Fig. 1.2). Canova too chose to depict the lovers’ farewell. In all these cases, the artists’ selection of a well-known myth from a classical text invites discussion about 19 Canova, as cited in Dorillo Dafneio, Lettera di Dorillo Dafneio a Diodoro Delfico (Serafino Petroncelli, 1795), 16–17. For ease of reference, going forward, page references are from a recent reprint. Carlo Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone, e Venere, di Carlo Castone Conte della Torre di Rezzonico, all. Ab. Saverio Bettinelli,” in Biblioteca canoviana, ossia raccolta delle migliori prose, e de’ più scelti componimenti poetici sulla vita, sulle opere ed in morte di Antonio Canova, ed. Arnaldo Bruni, Manlio Pastore Stocchi, and Gianni Venturi, 2 vols. (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2005), vol. 1, 75–87.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 1.2: Titian, Venus and Adonis, 1550s. Oil on canvas, 106.7 × 133.4 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Jules Bache Collection, 1949

the complexities involved in transforming the temporal progression inherent to literature into a work of art. Yet as a sculptor, Canova had to distill Ovid’s narrative into a single, concrete moment that best captured the story’s drama without any ancillary or contextual details. Moreover, formally he was constrained by the block of marble and by the challenge of stabilizing a work that had two standing figures. It is nonetheless a heartrending moment. Despite our own foreknowledge of the story’s tragic ending, the moment is rich with indecision

and indeterminacy. Lucchesi Palli, for instance, noted Venus’ own hesitancy and the “expression of two passions.”20 Her sensual desire is fueled by the “pleasure of gazing at” Adonis’ form, but this desire is rent by the “fatal presentiment of his death.”21 Perhaps no one expressed the seductive possibilities of the sculpture’s narrative better than Marcello Marchesini, a Venetian lawyer,

20 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 145. 21 Ibid.

Imagining Sculptural Prac tice

Fig. 1.3: Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (detail), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Bettina Jacot-Descombes

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

writer and poet.22 Marchesini recognized that Adonis too was indecisive; he is torn between two great desires, his passion for hunting, and the “sting of love.”23 Marchesini lingers on the way that Venus leans towards Adonis, with “voluptuous exhaustion,” “sweetly touching his chin with one of those expressive caresses that indicates the delicacy of a prayer”24 (Fig. 1.3). “Her abandoned sash falls negligently from her thighs and is held up only by the knot that remains imprisoned by the sweet contact” of their bodies.25 Adonis, in the meantime, “languidly holds” his dart, which drifts downwards as though its own weight threatens to pull it from his hand.26 Meanwhile, his faithful dog carefully watches the actions of the hunter, “awaiting his own destiny to either fly towards the woods, or rest indolent and inert,” standing guard over Venus and Adonis’ lovemaking instead27 (Fig. 1.4). The downward drifting motion of veil, dart, and limbs heighten the sensation that the two lovers could remain together and engage in

Fig. 1.4: Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (rear view), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Flora Bevilacqua

22 Marcello Marchesini, Sul gruppo d’Adone e Venere del signor Antonio Canova, posseduto dal … Marchese Berio. Lettera di Marcello Marchesini … al … Conte D. Faustino Tadini ([1795]). Marchesini’s text was published several times in the early nineteenth century. For ease of reference, I site from a recent reprint here. See Marcello Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini diretta al nob. sig. co. D. Faustino Tadini. Sul gruppo d’Adone e Venere del sig. Antonio Canova posseduto dal sig. Marchese Berio,” in Biblioteca canoviana, ossia raccolta delle migliori prose, e de’ più scelti componimenti poetici sulla vita, sulle opere ed in morte di Antonio Canova, ed. Arnaldo Bruni, Manlio Pastore Stocchi, and Gianni Venturi, 2 vols. (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2005), vol. 1, 160–179. 23 Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini,” vol. 1, 164. 24 Ibid. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 Ibid., vol. 1, 165.

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a fuller embrace. So too does the way Venus attempts to delay Adonis’ departure through her seductive touch—and indeed, it is the concept of touch which permeates the sculpture. Venus caresses Adonis’ face tenderly and rests her hand and head on his shoulder, as his own arm loops casually around her lower back (Fig. 1.5). Their intertwined limbs make his imminent departure even more poignant, and there is tension between the lingering gaze and regretful departure of touch. Even Adonis’ faithful dog nuzzles his rear and looks lovingly at his master. Venus and Adonis therefore thematizes an issue—touch—that is at the heart of both this work’s subject, and, more broadly, the art of sculpture itself. The illusion of flesh created by masterful carving techniques, the erotic subject, and the evocative display in the garden belied the marble’s materiality and had a visceral effect on viewers’ senses. Visitors repeatedly commented on the nubile flesh of the young lovers, their clear physical attraction to one another, and the sculpture’s explicit eroticism. It was as though beholders had stumbled onto a real physical union. Moreover, the intense “softness” and “suppleness” of Venus and Adonis’ flesh was repeatedly praised, as was the curvaceousness of Venus’ “serpentine line” and Adonis’ beauty.28 Not only did the sculpture move viewers to tears, as Luigia Giuli noted, but the lovers’ own youthfulness and exuberance could even physically invigorate the viewer. The elderly collector Giuseppe Lucchesi Palli barely had the strength in his legs to carry himself into the garden, but Canova’s “angelic semblances so electrified him that he seemed to be eighteen years old again.”29 That invigoration could inspire one to encroach

bodily on the lovers’ intimacy. Lucchesi Palli wanted to prick Venus’ and Adonis’ skin to see if they would bleed, a suggestion that is replete with sexual connotations.30 Likewise, Marchesa Sparapani Gentili Boccapaduli, an aristocrat well-known in Rome for her literary salon who saw the group during her stay in Naples from October 16 to December 21, 1795, was not content to merely look at the work.31 In a letter to Canova, she described how she wanted to reach out and touch the lovers’ flesh:

28 See, respectively, Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini,” vol. 1, 168; Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 81; and the citation in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 145. 29 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 145.

30 Ibid., 145. 31 For more on the Marchesa, see Isabella Colucci, “Il salotto e le collezioni della Marchesa Boccapaduli,” Quaderni storici Nuova Seria 116 (2004): 449–493. 32 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 149–150.

Through Sgr. Antonio d’Este, I saw your group, Venus and Adonis. I cannot express the pleasure it gave me; it was very well lit and entering in that little temple I felt how much ideal beauty touches our senses, a heroic truth inspires a sentiment of veneration. I was not content looking at it from all possible angles—I wanted to touch it, and I almost forgot that it was marble. My Canova, I am far from wanting to flatter you; this you would not stand, and I would not want to do it; I only want to express my sensations even if I am ignorant, as you know.32

Marchesa Boccapaduli’s reaction emblematizes the way eroticism, veneration, and reason were entangled in the response to works of art. Although ideal beauty should inspire “veneration,” that reverence is not distinct from pleasure, nor does it inspire reserve. Boccapaduli is quite explicit; looking at the sculpture was not enough. The beauty of the work and a lapse of reason, for she “almost forgot” that it was marble, prompted in her a carnal desire—the need to touch the work. While this was a long-standing trope in reactions to sculpture, the slippage

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Fig. 1.5: Antonio Canova, Venus and Adonis (detail), ca. 1795. Marble, 183 × 90 × 62 cm; pedestal, 86 × 104 × 89 cm. Ville de Genève, Musées d’art et d’histoire. Dépôt de la Ville de Genève, 1995. © Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, Switzerland, photographer: Flora Bevilacqua

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between reason and desire conveyed in her account was increasingly frowned upon in the eighteenth century. There was a fear that the sculptural form could propel one to unthinking action, reducing the human spectator to an automaton driven by emotional and physical desire. Admiration of sculpture, and particularly of the nude, was a tempting and potentially dangerous activity—for men and women. By the end of the eighteenth century, attempts were made to mitigate the potential sexual pleasure inspired by works of art by substituting and folding that sexual pleasure into aesthetic appreciation.33 Incorporating the figure of Venus into a larger art historical narrative comprised of comparanda, connoisseurship, and criticism could deflect, or at least justify, a viewer’s sensual interest through the guise of aesthetic discourse. In addition, any kind of narrative that paired Venus with a third party, like Adonis, lessened the potentially disruptive voyeurism—even as, of course, it licensed and therefore heightened legitimate voyeurism. In this instance, therefore, Adonis deflects our own potential intimacy with the goddess, and it is he who faces the dilemma whether to pursue the hunt, or to remain entranced by Venus’ voluptuousness. Yet the transition to aesthetic appreciation was not clear-cut, nor was it easy; the erotic subject of Venus and Adonis and the tactile, three-dimensional nature of sculpture itself conflicted with the intellectual appreciation and visual appraisal promoted by aesthetic philosophers. Instead, the very nature of sculpture meant that pleasure was rooted in the beholder’s physical experience of the work. 33 John Barrell, “‘The Dangerous Goddess’: Masculinity, Prestige, and the Aesthetic in Early Eighteenth-Century Britain,” Cultural Critique 12 (Spring 1989): 110, and Malcolm Baker, Figured in Marble: The Making and Viewing of Eighteenth-Century Sculpture (London: V&A Publications, 2000), 18.

Shifting Models of Display and Engagement The impossibility of dictating viewers’ responses to sculpture reiterates the gulf between theory and practice, between the ideal disembodied viewer and the incarnate individuals who encountered works of art. The artist’s physical act of creation and artists’ and patrons’ decisions governing the display of works of art exaggerated the distinction between the ruminations of philosophers and sensual pleasure. If sculpture itself could inspire touch because of its three-dimensional nature, display conditions not only enhanced, but encouraged, physical engagement with the work. Such was the case with the display of Venus and Adonis in Berio’s garden, and both the sculpture and the setting drew visitors to see the work. Berio’s palazzo, where the group was installed, had already been noteworthy prior to the arrival of Canova’s sculpture. In the 1770s, during the expansion of the city center, Giovan Domenico Berio hired Luigi Vanvitelli, the royal architect who had overseen the construction of the Palazzo Reale at Caserta, to demolish the building that had been on the site and build a new one. Located on the Via Toledo (now the Via Roma), one of the most fashionable and bustling streets in Naples—and close to the Palazzo Reale itself—the palazzo achieved notoriety after its completion. The Duke of Arcos, the Spanish ambassador, rented the building immediately to celebrate the baptism of Maria Teresa Carolina, the first-born child of King Ferdinand IV and Maria Carolina of Austria, in 1772.34 (Figs. 1.6 34 Lettera ad un amico nella quale si dà ragguaglio della funzione seguita in Napoli il giorno 6 Settembre del 1772. Per solennizzare il battesimo della Reale Infanta Maria Teresa Carolina Primogenita delle LL. MM. delle Due Sicilie il Re Ferdinando IV e Regina Maria Carolina Arciduchessa d’Austria; e delle feste date per quest’oggetto (Naples: Paolo di Simone, 1772).

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Fig. 1.6: “The Berio Palace on Via Toledo, façade,” from Lettera ad un amico nella quale si dà ragguaglio della funzione seguita in Napoli il giorno 6 Settembre del 1772. Per solennizzare il battesimo della Reale Infanta Maria Teresa Carolina primogenita delle LL. MM. delle Due Sicilie il Re Ferdinando IV e Regina Maria Carolina Archiduchessa d’Austria; e delle feste date per quest’oggetto. Naples: Paolo di Simone, 1772. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (89-B14272)

and 1.7). Around the same time, Felice Abate, the royal gardener, designed the garden to the rear of the building.35 It too was celebrated at the time of its completion. In a city with remarkably few piazzas but a passion for landscape, it is no surprise that the garden drew special attention, for it transformed the building into an oasis and refuge in the chaotic city center. By the time Berio inherited the palazzo in 1791, it was already illustrious, and the building, garden, and art collection reinforced family’s identity as both aristocrats and art patrons.

Unfortunately, only a few tantalizing comments by travelers suggest what the garden may have looked like. Augustus von Kotzebue recounts how “[Berio’s] large palace in the street Toledo is adorned in a very tasty manner, principally with bas-reliefs by the hand of Canova. […] The marquis possesses a garden, which is compared to the hanging-garden of Semiramis, for it lies in the second story. But it has one considerable advantage over its ancient prototype, in a pavilion containing a charming group of Venus and Adonis by Canova.”36 Lady Morgan

35 The gardener is identified in Felice Abate, Sui giardini anglo-cinesi e sulla condizione del giardinaggio in Napoli (n.p.: [1840?]), 8.

36 Augustus von Kotzebue, Travels through Italy in the Years 1804 and 1805, 4 vols. (London: Richard Phillips, 1806), vol. 2, 242–243.

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Fig. 1.7: “The Berio Palace on Via Toledo, façade of interior courtyard,” from Lettera ad un amico nella quale si dà ragguaglio della funzione seguita in Napoli il giorno 6 Settembre del 1772. Per solennizzare il battesimo della Reale Infanta Maria Teresa Carolina primogenita delle LL. MM. delle Due Sicilie il Re Ferdinando IV e Regina Maria Carolina Archiduchessa d’Austria; e delle feste date per quest’oggetto. Naples: Paolo di Simone, 1772. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (89-B14272)

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was taken by the “beautiful, cultivated garden, a paradise of flowers” and its Grecian temple with Doric columns.37 Given the popularity of English gardens in the eighteenth century, and the fact that one of Felice Abate’s descendants—of the same name—published a treatise in 1840 on the “Anglo-Chinese” garden, the profusion of flowers, terraced greenery, and the vista of a classical temple likely recalled the period’s famous English gardens, such that of Stowe, although on a smaller scale.38 While we can only speculate about the perspectives and vistas that would have been established in Berio’s garden, we are fortunate to have the Marchesa Boccapaduli’s detailed description of the sculpture in situ. Her account provides an intriguing glimpse into eighteenthcentury display and viewing practices. She wrote: I was aware that the Marchese Berio possessed a beautiful work by our celebrated sculptor Signor Antonio Canova. Wishing to see it, I found Signor d’Este, famed for his talents, who obtained me the pleasure. The work is a group that represents Venus and Adonis. This stone’s beauties are worthy of its subjects, to which are wondrously joined grace, sentiment, and a truly sublime and heroic truth. If Prometheus had had Canova’s chisel, he would not have had to steal fire from heaven to animate his stone. The possessor of this great work knows its value, and he did not fail to give it the place it deserved. For this purpose, he has had made a round temple, the vault of which has a light turquoise tint. Encircling it, there is a bas-relief stucco frieze, and green satin in the form of a curtain. Inside this temple the group is installed in one area with a pivot that permits one to turn it if one wishes. Above, there is a small canopy 37 Morgan, Lady (Sydney), Italy, 2 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, 1821), vol. 2, 359, note. 38 Abate, Sui giardini anglo-cinesi.

of red gauze, which besides providing a nice background, also serves to cover it when one wants. To obtain the best effect, the Marchese shows the group illuminated at night. Three candles in a semicircular tin lamp serve this function such that the object is remarkably illuminated, and the light is hidden to the lovers of this beautiful work.39

It was an installation that was worthy of both Berio and Canova; “the possessor of this great work knows its value,” she proclaimed, “and he did not fail to give it the place it deserved.”40 The temple may have resembled that made by Canova’s friend, the architect Giannantonio Selva in 1783, dedicated to Ceres and located at the Villa Manfrin in Sant’Artemio Treviso, which also had a blue vault and heavy Doric columns (Fig. 1.8). Although no drawings or paintings of Venus and Adonis in situ have yet been identified, this rendering by contemporary artist Daniel Bozhkov, based on the Marchesa’s description, helps us imagine the sculpture’s setting (Fig. 1.9). The secluded and evocative installation in Berio’s garden and the sculpture’s erotic subject encouraged a focused admiration of the sculpture’s sensuous qualities. Moreover, it reiterated the beholder’s physical enjoyment of the work. During the day, the riot of colors—the temple’s blue cupola, crimson and emerald silks, green foliage, and vibrant flowers—would make the creaminess of sculpture’s marble stand out, while the gentle curvature of the figures would have contrasted with the geometric rigidity of the Doric temple. At dusk, visitors meandered through perfumed flowers in balmy Mediterranean air to arrive at the temple, where they parted the 39 Cited in Isabella Colucci, “Antonio Canova, la Marchesa Margherita Boccapaduli e Alessandro Verri: Lettere e altre testimonianze inedite,” Paragone. Arte 49.579 (1998): 67. 40 Ibid.

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Fig. 1.8: Giannantonio Selva, Tempietto Dedicated to Ceres, Goddess of Abundance, in the Park of Villa Margherita, now Manfrin, Treviso, Italy, 1783. Photograph, ca. 1910. © Alinari Archives / Umberto Fini / Art Resource, NY

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Fig. 1.9: Daniel Bozhkov, Antonio Canova’s Venus and Adonis in situ, based on Marchesa Boccapaduli’s description, 2007. Pencil drawing, 20.3 × 25.4 cm. Collection of the author © Daniel Bozhkov

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silk curtains to reveal a glimpse of the lovers’ embrace and watch gentle curves of flesh disappear into the shadows cast by the torch. It was an experience that would enliven all the senses. The exhibit in Naples was one of the earliest moments in which Canova’s work was set apart in such a dramatic fashion for admiration and reiterates that what we might think of as “pre-modern” modes of display lingered into the modern era. Our own contemporary sensibilities might object to the work’s installation in a garden, where it threatens to become a pejoratively “decorative” attraction. At the same time, works as highly praised as Canova’s sculptures, known for their luminous finish and lustrous marble, would not now be exhibited outside, where exposure to the elements would certainly destroy the refined surface. In the eighteenth century, however, sculptures were a popular feature in the gardens of large estates. Some of Canova’s earliest commissions were intended for an outdoor setting. Although Canova completed only two of the works, Ludovico Rezzonico commissioned six statues from the artist for his villa at Bassano.41 Likewise, Canova’s Orpheus and Eurydice, made for Giovanni Falier, were intended for the garden of Falier’s villa near Asolo.42 Temples were equally common. Circular tempiettos “all’antica”—often housing sculptures, and frequently dedicated to the theme of love—were ubiquitous.43 The Temple of Venus at 41 See Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 26–27, note 29. 42 Museo Correr and Museo canoviano, Canova (New York: Marsilio, 1992), 214, no. 117. 43 J. G. Grohmann, Recueil de dessins d’une execution peu dispendieuse: Contenans des plans de petites maisons de campagne, petits pavillons de jardins, temples, hermitages, chaumieres, monumens, obélisques, ruines, portails, portes, grilles, bancs de jardins, chaises, volieres, gondoles, ponts, etc. (Venice: Joseph Remondini et fils, 1805), plate 8. Grohmann named the round “temple antique” as a key feature of eighteenth-century garden design.

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Stowe is perhaps the finest example, but others exist throughout France (Marie-Antoinette’s Temple de l’amour at Versailles), Russia (Peter the Great’s temple for his summer palace in St. Petersburg), and Italy (Selva’s tempietto for the Villa Manfrin in Treviso, the Temple of Diana at the Villa Borghese, and the tempietto of the English garden of the Reggia di Caserta, to name only a few) (Fig. 1.10). Berio was therefore capitalizing on a mode of display that had been all the rage throughout the century. At the same time, however, this model of display was jostling with the presentation of objects in newly founded museums, and, in this regard, Berio’s display was not without its faults. Berio and his architect were criticized for some minor details. These included the use of “serious” Doric columns, instead of “the graceful style of the Corinthian,” which would have been more fitting for the subject of the sculpture, and the frieze, which, had it displayed the funeral processions for Adonis would have completed the narrative suspended in the work. 44 The lighting, too, was imperfect, for “the light should have fallen from above, and therefore what was needed was to open a small cupola, as in the tribune in Florence and in all the famous galleries […] in France, Holland and England.”45 The individual behind this criticism, the Count Torre della Rezzonico—about whom more later—lays some of the blame at the feet of Berio’s architect for “having been perfectly ignorant” of all these foreign examples, “like most of our architects, who are mere practitioners and do not study the principles of art and do not consult the ancients.”46 Implicit in Rezzonico’s lament is a criticism of Italian (“our”) architects for lacking knowledge 44 Rezzonico, cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 151. 45 Ibid. 46 Ibid.

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Fig. 1.10: Jacques Rigaud, View of the Queen’s Theatre from the Rotunda at Stowe, Buckinghamshire, ca. 1739. Pen and ink, brush and wash, 29.5 × 49.5 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1942

of both ancient and modern architecture. Most frustrating, however, was the way that the display did not take advantage of the developments espoused by the “famous galleries” in Europe.47 That said, however much the architect was at fault, it was Berio himself “who cannot be forgiven” for these errors—“for he has traveled.”48 Even if Berio was working with an architect whose knowledge was provincial at best, he, as an erudite man of letters, should have consulted ancient sources for the construction of his tempietto. More importantly, however, 47 Ibid. 48 Ibid.

having been to the great museums in Europe, he should have referred to their installations as well. These museums utilized dramatic displays to exhibit objects and were quickly becoming the criteria by which all other exhibitions were judged. Not only did the institutionalization of art objects in museums reaffirm their authenticity and set the standard for the quality of “high” art, but museums also became the paradigm for exhibitions in private collections. If a collector did not keep up with the times and utilize these new exhibition techniques, he was opening himself up for criticism, as did Berio. While training in the classics could add to one’s status as a connoisseur, conversely, ignoring the

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model of antiquity—or worse yet, disregarding the most modern of artistic institutions, the museum—could reflect poorly on an individual and his collection. Moreover, these types of installations, in direct contrast to the more cerebral enjoyment of works of art encouraged by aesthetic philosophers, encouraged the viewers’ physical engagement with the object. The garden, the temple, the turntable, the lighting, the curtains and veils—all drew attention to the viewers’ identity as a carnal, sensual being. Touch was critical to visitors’ experience of the work. Not only were they were forced to part the silk curtain to gaze at the group, but they, or attendants, would reach out to grasp the bronze handle to slowly rotate the sculpture on its pedestal. Torchlight cast shadows that appeared to caress the lovers’ skin, encouraging beholders to reach out and touch the work itself. No wonder the Marchesa was not content to merely look at the group; who could resist the opportunity to caress the marble when presented in such a manner? The display of Canova’s sculpture was therefore suspended between two worlds—that of private collector and public museum, that of premodern engagement and modern institutional view. Berio’s display and beholders’ responses to Canova’s work, particularly those who wished to touch the sculpture, such as the Marchesa Boccapaduli, reiterate the pervasive conflict between intellect and physicality, reason and emotion, chastity and lust, spirit and incarnate form. Yet, the tendency to imagine the human response to works of art as easily divisible into one category or the other, while philosophically neat, denies the complicated reality of our embodied engagement with works of art. The bifurcation of human response into two extremes may enable us to categorize emotions and responses, but it is also an oversimplification; it is the product of trying to make sense of something difficult.

Sculptural Practice in the Literary Imagination For all the intellectual struggle that this emotionally charged reaction to works of art may have caused philosophers around Europe, it is striking that it is all but absent in the contemporary critical response to the work. This is not to say that writers did not also try to make sense of Canova’s work. They did, but they approached the sculpture from a different vantage point. They too were concerned with the separation between the intellectual and the physical, but they were more preoccupied with Canova’s own act of creation and with the way the sculpture could provide access to Canova’s working method. A debate took place publicly, in the city’s journals. Within months of the sculpture’s display in Naples, two authors, Marcello Marchesini and Carlo Castone, Count Torre della Rezzonico, both of whom I have already mentioned, wrote public treatises about the sculpture. Both took as their subject Canova’s working process. One focused on the diff iculty of imagining and selecting the perfect moment from the many possibilities suggested by Ovid’s text, the other on the way that idea was subsequently translated into marble. They were, in effect, questioning the relationship between literature and the basic components of artistic production, the twinned, yet juxtaposed elements of invention (“invenzione”), the creative selection of the subject, and execution (“esecuzione”), the act of chiseling and shaping the marble block. Venus and Adonis therefore provided a lens through which viewers could examine Canova’s working methods and consider the art of sculptural production more broadly. The f irst treatise to be circulated was a privately published open letter by Rezzonico, a traveler, intellectual, and aristocrat who was related to Pope Clement XIII Rezzonico (Fig. 1.11).

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Published under his pseudonym with the Accademia dell’Arcadia in Rome, Dorillo Dafneio, it was addressed to Saverio Bettinelli, another prominent literato, under his pseudonym, Diodoro Delf ico. It was then sent to a select number of nobles and intellectuals, as well as the King and Queen of Naples. Berio also knew the work, although extent of Berio’s intervention in its circulation is unclear. It was also widely published throughout the Italian peninsula. 49 Rezzonico’s letter was almost immediately followed by the lyrical text of Marcello Marchesini. Although it is unclear whether Marchesini’s text was intended as a direct response to Rezzonico’s, the two complement one another. Both Marchesini and Rezzonico praise Canova’s sculpture, but both also focus on different aspects of the creative process, crystallizing the debate that flourished since the Renaissance regarding the two-pronged nature of artistic production. Although Marchesini’s text came second, his piece encapsulates the first phase of artistic production, that of invenzione. Marchesini, therefore, privileges Canova’s concept of the work. In what is the most poetic and beautifully written of the two texts, he not only describes the narrative moment Canova selected, but projects himself into the text, imagining himself as Canova. The language he uses describes labor—“I sweat, suffer, anguish”—but it is not physical labor that pushes Canova to such extremes.50 Rather, it is the intellectual labor and the great distance Marchesini, as Canova, sees between the sublimity of his ideas and the final product. The 49 For some of the nineteenth-century republications, see Christina Ferando, “Canova and the Writing of Art Criticism in Eighteenth-Century Naples,” Word & Image: A Journal of Verbal/Visual Enquiry 30.4 (Jan. 2014): 366 and 372, notes 17 and 20. 50 Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini,” vol. 1, 163.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

expectations of others, and of himself, cause the artist great pain, and although Marchesini’s imaginary Canova would like to find comfort in the praise of others, he is “held back by a thousand difficulties, that are born in my mind. I turn inward: I think, reflect, and the image of the beautiful and the grand that I picture in my fantasy transports me to ecstasy.”51 Marchesini goes on to describe the immense difference between what the artist imagines and that which must emerge from the marble block. It is the difficulty of selecting the perfect moment: “I see Adonis. I see Venus. How handsome the first, how beautiful the second. Adonis goes to hunt, Venus holds him back. I see in that subject a thousand moments of action, that could all be interesting. Let us choose the most delicate. There it is.”52 The importance placed on invenzione in Marchesini’s text has its roots in classical antiquity and goes back to Vitruvian rhetoric.53 It became more mainstream in the Renaissance arguments on the paragone, the relationship between painting and sculpture. This debate originated with the writings of Leonardo who characterized painting as an intellectual craft, sculpture as a mechanical one.54 Michelangelo was among the many to defend his art, and the emphasis on invention in Marchesini’s text can be seen as part of this long-standing desire to counter the supposed anti-intellectualism of sculpture.55 In so doing, Marchesini affirms the 51 Ibid. 52 Ibid. 53 See the entries for “concetto” and “invenzione, invenzioni” in Luigi Grassi and Mario Pepe, Dizionario della critica d’arte, 2 vols. (Turin: UTET, 1978), vol. 1, 123 and 262–264, respectively. 54 See Claire J. Farago, ed., Leonardo da Vinci’s Paragone: A Critical Interpretation with a New Edition of the Text in the Codex Urbinas (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), esp. 257. 55 David Summers, Michelangelo and the Language of Art (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981), 269–278.

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medium’s status as an art, rather than merely a craft, and ensures its practitioners—particularly Canova—are appreciated as artists and intellectuals. Moreover, for Marchesini, Canova’s selection of the perfect moment occurs in an instant, in a flash of inspiration which likewise can be traced to the Renaissance concepts of furia and furore.56 Canova’s “genius” allowed him to sketch out the first bozzetto (sketch) of the work with “more spirit than correctness.”57 The sketch, completed with a rapidity of execution that reveals the fire of imagination and does not stifle its spirit, is the ultimate product of invention. Certainly, Marchesini is concerned about the final execution of the work, but only in so far as he believes that a sculptor must have the right tools and enough ability to achieve a perfect enough imitation of the subject so that it is not cold and inanimate. There must be no difference other than that of material between the marble and the “real subject” that the artist wishes to express. The true challenge of the artist, therefore, is “to seek out the beautiful, know it, gather it, distribute it, and apply it to your subject.”58 Rezzonico, on the other hand, privileges Canova’s handling of the marble, his esecuzione, throughout his text.59 His treatise explores Canova’s carving in detail, even delineating the different tools used for different sections of the sculpture (Fig. 1.12). Canova creates “the imitation of skin through the serrated teeth, the 56 For furia and furore, see the entries in Grassi and Pepe, Dizionario, vol. 1, 207–208. For more on the relationship between furia and invenzione, see Summers, Michelangelo and the Language of Art, chapter IV, esp. 62 and 68. 57 Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini,” vol. 1, 164. 58 Ibid., vol. 1, 166–167. 59 See the entry for “esecuzione,” in Grassi and Pepe, Dizionario, vol. 1, 177.

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Fig. 1.11: Zecchino, after a drawing by G. B. Bosio, Portrait of Cav.re Carlo Castone Conte della Torre di Rezzonico, ca. 1815–1818. Etching, 21.7 × 15.3 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

sharpened chisel, the biting rasp, and through their mixed fiddling, shaving, turning on a lathe, coercing an appearance of malleable flesh that only the coldness of stone can disillusion.”60 Rezzonico guides the viewer’s eye to points of the sculpture where this mastery is best seen, steering viewers who are not connoisseurs to look at the passages in the sculpture that will best reveal Canova’s handiwork. “There is no 60 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 78.

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Fig. 1.12: Antonio Canova’s tools. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy

better place to see the magisterial use of the tools,” he wrote, “the impasto of their point, their cut, their grooves and their channels and roughness than in the drapery around Venus.”61 (Rezzonico even goes so far as to direct the beholder’s viewing methods, suggesting that such “varied artif ice” cannot be recognized by the “wise eye” alone, but must be examined with candlelight to see the mastery of the touch—which was, of course, the way Berio encouraged visitors to see the group.62) The scholar’s references to tools were so detailed that Jean-Baptiste Seroux d’Agincourt (1730–1813), a 61 Ibid., vol. 1, 82. 62 Ibid., vol. 1, 78.

French archaeologist, art historian, and collector who was also a member of the Accademia dell’Arcadia, believed Rezzonico’s description could be used as a guide to future artists. Should Venus and Adonis, or, the art of carving itself, be lost, the work could be recreated through Rezzonico’s precise description of the tools used.63 63 Cited in Giambattista Giovio, “Della vita e degli scritti del Cavaliere Carlo Castone Conte della Torre di Rezzonico, patrizio comasco, memorie del Cavaliere e Conte Giambatista Giovio,” in Carlo Castone, Opere del cavaliere Carlo Castone Conte della Torre di Rezzonico. Prose sulle belle arti, ed. Francesco Mocchetti, 10 vols. (Como: Carlantonio Ostinelli, 1815), vol. 1, cviii–cix, and cix, note 2.

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These two authors, therefore, continue in the well-trodden path of imagining the act of artistic creation as divided into two categories, the intellectual and physical. Both tried to shed light on Canova’s working practice, trying to render comprehensible the mysteries of sculptural creation, artistic divination, and the carving process. The one aspect of Canova’s execution that they both touched on, however, was not directly related to the art of carving; both writers commented upon Canova’s treatment of the surface with oil and encaustic.64 Each also paid attention to the distinction created between cloth and flesh, once again highlighting the most sensual and evocative passage in the sculpture, Venus’ cascading drapery. Yet in describing this part of Canova’s finishing—so crucial to the appreciation of his sculptures—the authors do not mediate the sculptor’s physical engagement with the work through the use of tools. That is, reading Rezzonico’s and Marchesini’s descriptions, we can almost imagine Canova gently caressing his figures to lightly coat their flesh with oil, pausing at the juncture where flesh meets drapery along Venus’ thigh. It was that hand, that finish, which gave life to his figures, and which in turn so aroused viewers that they hoped the marble flesh would yield to their touch.

The Authority of the Author It was precisely Rezzonico’s continual referencing of artist’s tools, however, that led a third party to enter the debate and placed Rezzonico’s and Marchesini’s texts at the heart of a large polemic that raged in Naples throughout 1795 and 1796. The two texts were pitted against one 64 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 82–83, and Marchesini, “Lettera di Marcello Marchesini,” vol. 1, 174.

Fig. 1.13: Portrait of Tommaso Gargallo, frontispiece from Le opere di Orazio Flacco, recate in versi italiani di Tommaso Gargallo. Como: Figli di C. A. Ostinelli, 1827. Original source K. K. Hofbibliothek, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek. Digital image: Google Books

another by a third writer, Tommaso Gargallo, a young intellectual from Syracuse, who published a vituperative response to Rezzonico’s text entitled Alcune annotazioni ad una lettera di Dorillo Dafneio in the summer of 179565 (Fig. 1.13). One of the central issues of Gargallo’s Annotazioni was precisely the question of which text, Rezzonico’s or Marchesini’s, provided the reader with the best understanding of Canova’s sculpture. Gargallo’s annotations, a line-by-line critique of Rezzonico’s text appended to a republication of Rezzonico’s original letter, prompted additional responses by both Marchesini and Rezzonico, as well as other anonymous authors. It is worth clarifying the sequence of publications to give a sense of the far-reaching and lengthy debate. Gargallo’s Annotazioni inspired 65 See [Gargallo], Alcune annotazioni ad una lettera di Dorillo Dafneio ([Naples?], [1795]).

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another critique of Rezzonico’s work by an anonymous writer (but who has been identified as Gaetano d’Ancora, a Neapolitan archaeologist and philologist) in the August 1795 issue of the Giornale lettario di Napoli.66 Subsequently, a defense of Rezzonico’s text (and, conversely, a critique of Gargallo’s Annotazioni), appeared in the September issue of Effemeridi enciclopediche.67 Although this too was submitted by an anonymous writer, Rezzonico suggests it was drafted by Marchesini himself.68 This was followed by another letter from d’Ancora, submitted anonymously to the November volume of the Giornale letterario.69 After a brief lull in the winter months, there was a flurry of publications with the new year. The January 1796 issue of Effemeridi enciclopediche was dedicated to Rezzonico and also included a critique of the November issue of the Giornale letterario by yet another anonymous writer (perhaps Marchesini 66 [Gaetano d’Ancora], “Roma. Essendoci pervenuta la seguente lettera,” Giornale letterario di Napoli per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi XXXIII (August 15, 1795): 75–79. Gaetano d’Ancora identifies himself as the author of the three anonymous letters in volumes 33, 38, and 49 of the Giornale letterario di Napoli in a note to an article published in Atti dell’Accademia italiana di scienze, lettere ed arti. See Gaetano d’Ancora, “Memorie sulle precauzioni ottiche degli antichi per conservare ed aguzzare la vista,” in Atti dell’Accademia italiana di scienze, lettere ed arti, vol. 1, part 1 (Livorno: Presso Tommaso Masi, 1810), 49, note 2. 67 “Alcune annotazioni ad una lettera di Dorillo Dafnejo. Opera senza data, e senza nome tipografico, d’autore anonimo,” Effemeridi enciclopediche per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi (Sept. 1795): 64–90. 68 Filalete Nemesiano [Carlo Castone, Conte Torre di Rezzonico], Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano a Don Limone (Roma, 1796), 6–9 and 25. 69 [Gaetano d’Ancora], “Roma. Dopo di aver pubblicata,” Giornale letterario di Napoli per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi XXXVIII (November 1, 1795): 45–47.

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again?).70 To this text, d’Ancora responded for a third time, defending his theories in the April 1796 journal of the Giornale letterario.71 As these texts were circling, Rezzonico published his own anonymous response to Gargallo, Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano a Don Limone, in 1796.72 Gargallo, not to be undone, wrote some very witty and cruel epigrams about Rezzonico. Although there is no evidence that these were published in 1796, it is likely they circulated in salons and other literary circles. They were finally published by Gargallo in 1830 along with other epigrams.73 The entire debate seemed to die only with the death of Rezzonico himself in June 1796. What, precisely, caused this argument remains unclear, since the two men had been on good terms prior to 1795. In stories that mirror one another, however, each claimed that the other had been offended by the Neapolitan’s poor reception of a piece of writing, and thus they took their anger and frustration out on one another.74 Regardless of the spark that initiated the feud, its viciousness was fueled by wounded egos. Gargallo, for his part, refused to spare any aspect of Rezzonico’s Lettera in his Annotazioni. 70 “A’ Signori compilatori del Giornale letterario di Napoli,” Effemeridi enciclopediche per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi (January 1796): 81–91. 71 [Gaetano d’Ancora], “Roma. Dopo le due lettere di un anonimo,” Giornale letterario di Napoli per servire di continuazione all’Analisi ragionata de’ libri nuovi XLIX (April 15, 1796): 3–7. 72 See Nemesiano, Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano. 73 See Tommaso Gargallo, Degli epigrammi. Libri due (Florence: Chiari, 1830), 73–80. The epigrams are published as “Estratti dallo Zeronico,” a play on Rezzonico’s name. 74 See Gargallo, Opere edite ed inedite. Memorie autobiografiche, ed. Marchese Filippo Francesco di Castel Lentini, 4 vols. (Florence: Le Monnier, 1923), vol. 1, 72–79; and Nemesiano, Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano, 14, 15, 20 and 22.

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Although Gargallo’s criticisms are primarily rooted in Rezzonico’s use of language, to which I will return, he also viciously attacks Rezzonico’s sense of self-importance. Gargallo’s personal criticisms of Rezzonico concentrated mainly on Rezzonico’s claims for expertise in sculpture. First and foremost was Rezzonico’s use of technical vocabulary, particularly his references to sculptural tools. Gargallo feels these phrases to be, at best, bastardized Italian, and at worst, pompous and incomprehensible. This is prompted, in part, by Gargallo’s feeling that Rezzonico has somehow overstepped his boundaries and overstated his understanding of sculptural practice. Gargallo was particularly irked that in anticipation of the publication of Rezzonico’s text the citizens of Naples were in such ecstasy that they exclaimed, the “greatest writer […] writes about the greatest sculptor!”75 They were apparently so overcome by this union that “some of them even thought to engrave a special monogram, entwining a pen and a chisel.”76 Greatness with the pen, however, would hardly lead to competency with a chisel, and it is precisely this blurring between the boundaries of writing and art that frustrates Gargallo.77 How could a writer, one who had himself never handled these tools, possibly understand sculptural technique? For that matter, how could he even identify the tools at all? If Rezzonico is not in the position to recognize the tools he so carefully lists, who then is qualified to write about sculptural practice? For Gargallo, it must be someone who has practical, hands-on experience. In this case, he suggests that any technical knowledge Rezzonico gained about Canova’s sculptures had nothing to do with his scholarly erudition but, rather, was dependent on the practical knowledge of

Antonio d’Este—the director of Canova’s studio and sculptor in his own right.78 D’Este also led visitors to see the work and may very well have discussed Canova’s technical merit with those visitors. Nonetheless, d’Este, as an artist himself, would have a better understanding of the technical aspects of carving than Rezzonico could ever have. Connoisseurship that resulted from vision alone could only go so far in the absence of practical knowledge, according to Gargallo. Gargallo effectively accuses Rezzonico of intellectual dishonesty—plagiarism—by taking credit for ideas that were given to him by someone else. For his part, Rezzonico defends himself by suggesting his text had been written well before he met d’Este and that all the technical observations were truly his own.79 More importantly, for him, d’Este’s identity as a sculptor does not necessarily render him more qualified to speak about works of art. One need not be an artist to comprehend sculptural practice; observation was on par with execution as a means of understanding and appreciating a work of art. In fact, attentive observation established authority. Recall, for instance, Rezzonico’s directive to use candlelight to study Venus and Adonis’ drapery. He clearly thought of himself as a guide. When directed by an individual trained in the art of looking—who understood where to look, how to look—any viewer could achieve deeper understanding of an object. This applied both to trained and untrained viewers. For dilettantes, Rezzonico’s writing encouraged them to look more closely. Moreover, the emphasis on sculptural execution and tools might mitigate potentially licentious thoughts on the part of viewers. By redirecting their attention to the marble, and to Canova’s labor, Rezzonico

75 [Gargallo], Alcune annotazioni, 4. 76 Ibid. 77 Ibid., 43–44.

78 Ibid., 36. 79 Nemesiano, Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano, 96 and 104.

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encouraged viewers to engage with the physical qualities of the stone and Canova’s carving while at the same time defusing their erotic attraction to the figures. His writing emphasized Canova’s physical engagement with the work, even as it stressed viewers’ visual engagement with the sculpture. For trained viewers, Rezzonico’s pedagogical aims were more explicit. He even suggested that his observations would ultimately prove “necessary, useful and valuable to craftsmen.”80 His writing could provide a model for artists, thus inverting the chain of knowledge for which Gargallo had critiqued him. If Gargallo’s criticism cast doubt on Rezzonico’s interpretation of Canova’s modern work, so too did it threaten Rezzonico’s judgment on ancient works as well. Rezzonico relied on ancient citations and comparisons between ancient and modern sculpting techniques to establish his authority as a critic of modern art, reinforcing the period’s belief that understanding one period could provide access to and better knowledge of the other. This fluidity, the reciprocal relationship between antiquity and modernity, manifested itself in his text in numerous ways. Consider, for instance, Rezzonico’s argument that the eyes of Canova’s Venus “spark with a languid, loving laugh” because of the sculptor’s use of ancient carving methods.81 He suggests Canova used a technique similar to that found in the Venus de’Medici, in which the “natural globosity” of the pupil has been rendered “smoother and flatter,” thus relying both on formal analysis and on a quotation by Ovid to make his point.82 For Gargallo, this precise description can only be due, once again, to Antonio d’Este’s technical expertise. Moreover, Gargallo was irked by these repeated references 80 Ibid., 104. 81 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 81. 82 Ibid., vol. 1, 81–82.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

to antiquity, particularly Rezzonico’s reliance on ancient authors to reinforce his points. Gargallo loathes these citations for their obfuscating nature—not to mention for what he sees as the indulgent self-promotion of Rezzonico’s own erudition. Of course, for Rezzonico, the citation of ancient texts did reaff irm the strength of his education. More importantly, these citations—and the production of his own written text—allowed him to contribute to and participate in a long chain of ekphrastic writing, validating his scholarly endeavor. At the same time, however, citation of ancient sources was yet another way for Rezzonico to reiterate the parallels between antiquity and the eighteenth century. This was particularly the case because the act of reading was one way that viewers in both antiquity and the eighteenth century gained a better understanding of the object, and, moreover, increased the pleasure they received from the work. In antiquity, for instance, literary subjects were transformed into wall paintings and sculptures, and the profusion of inscriptions provided multiple ways of reading works of art.83 At times, literature was recited in front of works of art. In a memorable passage in Plutarch, for instance, Porcia and Brutus contemplate a painting depicting a scene from the Iliad, the parting of Hector and Andromache. Brutus himself is about to leave his wife, and while Porcia weeps, one of Brutus’ friends recites Homer’s poem.84 Likewise, eighteenth-century admirers of the fine arts had a similar relationship to text. 83 See, for instance, the essays in Zahra Newby and Ruth E. Leader-Newby, eds., Art and Inscriptions in the Ancient World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). 84 See Hérica Valladares, “The Lover as Model Viewer: Gendered Dynamics in Propertius 1.3,” in Gendered Dynamics in Latin Love Poetry, ed. Ronnie Ancona and Ellen Greene (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005), 217–218.

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Texts that described and analyzed works of art flourished because of a heightened interest in connoisseurship and the social manner in which art was viewed. Salons, for instance, were often organized around the unveiling of a work of art. An evening’s entertainment might revolve around identifying a work’s iconography or the artist’s identity, whether ancient or modern. Historical texts might be read to contextualize the object, and participants might also share contemporary open letters, songs, and poems about the work. These same letters and poems were often published as stand-alone texts or in public journals, affording them a wide circulation. This public intermingling of art and literature was paralleled in private correspon­dence, as the same open letters, poems, epigrams, and inscriptions were often exchanged as signs of intimacy and friendship. Countless poems and texts were written about Canova’s sculptures. His Venus and Adonis prompted poems by both Rezzonico and Gargallo, and even the frontispiece of Marchesini’s text opened with a poem.85 At times, contemporary authors were praised and cited. Visitors often read Johann Winckelmann’s description of ancient sculptures in preparation for visits to the Museo Pio-Clementino or the Capitoline.86 Winckelmann’s writing 85 Gargallo’s poem, Sonnetto vii a Fillide che osserva il gruppo di Venere e Adone del Canova, is published in Tommaso Gargallo, Opere edite ed inedite. Poesie italiane e latine, ed. Marchese Filippo Francesco di Castel Lentini and Giovambattista Piccinelli, 4 vols. (Florence: L. Franceschini, 1924), vol. 2, 374–375. For Abate Santucci’s poem, see the frontispiece of Marchesini, Sul gruppo d’Adone e Venere. Cesare della Valle, Duca di Ventignano, likewise wrote a poem on the work. See Cesare della Valle, Lalage nello studio di Canova (Naples: Tipografia di Angelo Trani, 1814), 22–24. 86 See Elisabeth Chevallier, “L’œuvre d’art dans le temps. Comment on a vu le Laocoön et l’Apollon du Belvedere à la f in du XVIIIè siècle, d’après la relation

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not only provided insight to ancient works, but also to modern ones. Rezzonico, for instance, suggested that anyone who had read and studied Winckelmann would be able to understand the heroic proportions of Canova’s Venus and Adonis “at a glance.”87 Rezzonico had a personal interest in this habit of reading in preparation for the examination and admiration of a work of art, for his Lettera a Dorillo Dafneio was read aloud both in the Accademia dell’Arcadia and in front of Canova’s statue at the Palazzo Berio.88 The tight link between viewing and reading therefore reiterates the idea that neoclassicism was not simply a style of art, but a style of thought that depended on a neoclassical education, as Viccy Coltman has argued. 89 Education and material culture went hand in hand, and books were crucial to the critical examination of both classical and contemporary objects. Writing and reading about a work of art were therefore both ways of contributing to its public understanding and a fundamental part of the viewing experience in the late eighteenth century. Transforming observation into a larger literary and performative experience may have been seen, in part, as imitation of the very actions of the ancients themselves. This was, after all, a period when the fascination with antiquity manifested itself in numerous forms. At the same time, these texts became crucial to the viewer’s relationship with the work, for d’un voyageur allemand venu à Rome en 1783. Naissance et disparition d’une mode,” in Aiôn: Le temps chez les Romains, ed. Raymond Chevallier (Paris: A. & J. Picard, 1976), 333–353. 87 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 78. 88 See Giovio, “Della vita e degli scritti del Cavaliere Carlo Castone,” cviii, and Nemesiano, Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano, 75, respectively. 89 Viccy Coltman, Fabricating the Antique: Neoclassicism in Britain, 1760–1800 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006).

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

both the writing and reading of them became part and parcel of connoisseurship itself; they were as crucial to the experience of looking at art as looking itself. For Rezzonico, if contemporary writing increased the understanding and enjoyment of Canova’s Venus and Adonis, ancient texts were as, if not more, useful. Those writers not only had had direct contact with the ancient masterpieces so admired in the period, but their descriptions could also be readily applied to modern works. Not only were the mythological subjects and sculpting techniques of ancient and modern artists similar, but what better way was there to reinforce the parallels between antiquity and the eighteenth century than the use of ancient sources? Examining Rezzonico’s letter in this light explains his dependence on ancient texts. Canova’s Venus and Adonis “challenges” the verses of Theocritus, which encapsulate the beauty of Adonis and the sweetness of his kiss; Ovid captures the spark of Venus’ glance; and who better to describe the translucent tunic that drapes around body of Venus than Seneca, Pliny the Elder, Marcus Valerius Martialis, Horace, and Sextus Aurelius Propertius, all of whom would have witnessed those very fabrics clinging to the hips of beautiful Greek and Roman women?90 Likewise, it is no wonder that in a letter to Canova Rezzonico bragged that in his “Grecian work,” he used “many Greek phrases taken from poets and writers that spoke of the Cnidian Venus,” and he even “wanted to turn your [Canova’s] name into Greek, to substitute that of Praxiteles in an epigram of the anthology.”91 If, as Rezzonico claimed, the Cnidian Venus and Canova’s Venus and Adonis equaled one another in their beauty, ancient texts describing the former could readily be

applied to the latter; the works were equivalent to one another. These ancient texts do not merely reference the art of the past, however, but also bring forth the lived experience of the ancients themselves. That is, citation allows the reader/viewer to recreate the experience of the past imaginatively and create parallels between their modern experience and that of the ancients. Rezzonico, for instance, suggests that Canova himself is part of this resurrection of antiquity. Venus and Adonis is so splendid that one cannot but suspect the soul of Praxiteles himself transmigrated into the body of Canova.92 For those mere mortals who might not be endowed with the talents of the ancient Greek masters, they can, at least, relive the viewing experience of the ancients. When summoning forth the marvel that Callicrates, one of the architects of the Parthenon, felt when confronted with Praxiteles’ Cnidian Venus, Rezzonico suggests Callicrates would express the very same emotions and even utter the very same exclamations if he were confronted with Canova’s Venus and Adonis.93 Eliminating any understanding that Callicrates would have venerated the Cnidian Venus as a goddess, Rezzonico instead describes Callicrates’ reaction as a purely aesthetic one. Callicrates’ encounter with the Cnidian Venus is reimagined as an exhibition like that of Canova’s Venus and Adonis. Aesthetic appreciation, wonder, and marvel in the face of a work of art are therefore presented as timeless and universal, uniting the eighteenth century and the classical past. If Gargallo dismisses the idea that these citations might provide better access to Canova’s sculpture, Rezzonico includes them precisely because they enable him—and his readers—to see more clearly; one learns to look through the

90 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 77, 82, and 83–84, respectively. 91 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 151.

92 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 75–76. 93 Ibid., vol. 1, 79–80.

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process of reading. For Rezzonico, an education in the classical texts and the understanding of ancient and contemporary sculpture go hand in hand. To Canova, he wrote, “Many boast that they appreciate works of art, and speak plenty about it; very few have done the studies necessary to fully understand the depth of the mastery of the ancients, and those rare moderns who approach them.”94 For those who are not up to snuff, it is up to Rezzonico, as a scholar of both ancient and contemporary literature and a student of observation, to act as their guide. His “tireless study” will help both observers and artists appreciate Canova’s work, “since the craftsman who does not reason and imagine will not succeed in reaching the apex of imitation.”95 Gargallo and Rezzonico therefore propose two opposing models of connoisseurship—one based on practical training, the other on study and observation; one that is not contingent on the study of the literature and antiquity, the other that is fully so. In the end, though, the issue that really set the two against one other was the question of how this knowledge of art—however it might be gained—should be expressed. For Rezzonico, knowledge and expression went hand in hand. Understanding of the arts, which depended on a classical education and appreciation of technique, could only be expressed through ancient citations, Greek and Latin quotations, and technical language. The complexity of the text paralleled the complexity of the work of art—its ancient source, its technical difficulty, its complex execution. Gargallo, on the other hand, criticizes this complexity and what he sees as poor grammar, manipulation and misuse of Italian words, rambling and pedantic sentences, and mistranslations from Greek and Latin.96 94 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 151. 95 Ibid., 152. 96 See [Gargallo], Alcune annotazioni, 25–26, 34 and 41.

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Rezzonico’s language, Gargallo suggests, was alienating and narrowly focused—not to mention overstated and pompous. This was a far cry from the writing of Marchesini and his lyrical contemplation of Canova’s creative imagination. Marchesini’s text, for Gargallo, provides the best understanding of Canova’s work. According to Gargallo, this understanding does not occur despite the absence of technical language, but precisely because of that absence. Not only is the text better written from a grammatical point of view, but the omission of pompous and pedantic phrases makes Marchesini’s meaning clearer. In fact, Marchesini’s writing mimics the art of invention itself; the freedom with which invention inspires a sketch equally inspires graceful, natural, and clear writing. Connoisseurship overly weighed down by facts and information, therefore, can never provide intimate knowledge of art—all it can do, as Gargallo notes, dripping with sarcasm, is highlight a “sublime manner of making phrases.”97 Ironically, despite their different approaches to connoisseurship and writing, both Rezzonico and Gargallo turn to the same individual to reassert the correctness of their opinions—Canova himself. Rezzonico, for instance, includes a letter by the artist as an appendix to his Lettera di Dorillo Dafneio, comparing it to one which Raphael wrote to Baldassare Castiglione about his Galatea.98 For Rezzonico, Canova’s letter aligned him with other great artists who had written about their work. He inserted Canova’s writing into a historical continuum and asserted Canova’s position as both artist and author. In so doing, Rezzonico treated Canova’s writing the same way he did the writing of classical authors and contemporary scholars. The sculptor’s letter did not just add local color to his text, but it 97 Ibid., 39. 98 Castone, “Descrizione del gruppo in marmo di Adone,” vol. 1, 86.

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was also supporting evidence for Rezzonico’s argument. Likewise, by reaffirming Canova’s identity as an author, the letter linked Rezzonico to the sculptor as the former strove to cement his own legacy as author and connoisseur. Rezzonico may have been imagining himself as a modern Vasari, for Vasari relied on the letters of Michelangelo for his biography of the sculptor, a connection which secured his fame.99 For Gargallo, on the other hand, Rezzonico’s inclusion of Canova’s letter serves only to reinforce the terrible failure of Rezzonico’s text; it forces a comparison between Rezzonico’s stilted language and Canova’s graceful expression. The former inevitably suffers by comparison: “[W]hat grace, what naturalness and what heat of imagination in the few lines of the immortal sculptor! [Canova] does not set [words], he does not inlay [them]: he writes. [H]e feels, and writes.”100 For Gargallo, Rezzonico was guilty of the crime of so many “scholars of the fine arts”—“patching together their writing” by intricately laying in one idea after another, in “leaden pedantry.”101 The artist’s expression about his own work, on the other hand, was seen as the most honest, and reasserted the superiority of Marchesini’s text, for Marchesini also writes “clearly,” as freely as Canova, with the same “naturalness, loveliness and sentiment.”102 In fact, according to Gargallo, rumors abounded that Canova himself had spoken with Marchesini, revealing the intimate details of his sculptural process precisely because he had been unhappy with Rezzonico’s text. Canova, it would seem, thought that Marchesini would be best able “to describe 99 See Deborah Parker, Michelangelo and the Art of Letter Writing (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010), esp. chapter 1, “The Role of Letters in Michelangelo’s Biographies,” 11–23. 100 [Gargallo], Alcune annotazioni, 51. 101 Ibid., 51. 102 Ibid., 52.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

[his sentiments] in a manner most intelligible to us mortals.”103 The dichotomy Gargallo establishes between Marchesini’s and Rezzonico’s writing therefore reasserts the respective interest in invention and execution expressed by the two authors; their means of expression mimics the content of the texts themselves. At the same time, the fact that both Rezzonico and Gargallo turn to Canova to validate their arguments about writing, artistic practice, and forms of connoisseurship indicates the way artists’ thoughts were regularly used to endorse the authority of critics. Such deference implies there is no better critic than the artist himself, an argument that stretches back to antiquity.104 More interestingly, Rezzonico’s and Gargallo’s eagerness to cite Canova suggests a truth that both men were likely unwilling to admit, particularly once their feud became so public and so vituperative—namely, that the dialectic between invention and execution, both in the practice of art and in the practice of writing about art—is a false one. Both are necessary to the production of a great work of art and a great piece of writing. Venus and Adonis would not have achieved the fame it did had it not so perfectly encapsulated the poignant departure between the two lovers and been so exquisitely carved. Works of art, especially great works of art, rely on a combination of conception and execution, in which ideas are translated and transformed into concrete, often beautiful, objects. For the work to exist, the thought must be performed in some way. Both parts of the creative process 103 Ibid., 52. 104 For the history of judgment, see Livio Pestilli, “Bellori’s ‘Old Lady’: On Informed Versus Uninformed Criticism,” Word & Image: A Journal of Verbal/Visual Inquiry 26.4 (2010): 396. The idea that the artist was the best judge of his craft was repeated by eighteenthcentury sculptors, notably Étienne Falconet. See Anne Betty Weinshenker, Falconet: His Writings and His Friend Diderot (Geneva: Droz, 1966), 67–74.

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are difficult and time-consuming, even when— particularly when—the final product seems effortless. Perhaps the biggest danger of the Rezzonico/Gargallo debate is that it threatens to obscure the real labor that is at the core of both parts of the process. It is easy to understand why the act of sculpting would be difficult; the tools and manual labor require an exacting precision that is daunting. Yet, even sketching those initial ideas, imagining the perfect moment—those too are fraught with diff iculty. Marchesini understood this; “I sweat, suffer, anguish,” he wrote, about the artist’s thought process. So, too, of course, did Canova. The diff iculty of the physical process of sculpting was evident simply in his declining health, damaged, it was said, from years of crushing his chest against the chisel as it pressed into the stone block.105 The conceptual process was no different. Years after Venus and Adonis debuted in Naples, Canova articulated the difficult work that went into the act of composition in a letter to his lifelong friend and correspondent, the theorist and aca­ demician Quatremère de Quincy. “It takes more than stealing here and there from ancient pieces and sticking them together indiscriminately to make a great artist!” he wrote. “You have to sweat night and day over Greek models, absorb their style, take them into your blood, and create your own work by always having the beauties of nature beneath your eye and by reading there the same maxims.”106 Both sides of the coin were essential to the process, and both were equally difficult. Canova’s sculptures may have looked effortless, but that was only because of the intense labor they required, on all fronts. 105 Leopoldo Cicognara, Biografia di Antonio Canova (Venice: Giambattista Missiaglia, 1823), 15–16. 106 Cited in Antonio Canova and Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Il Carteggio Canova-Quatremère de Quincy, 1785–1822, ed. Giuseppe Pavanello and Fran­ cesco Paolo Luiso (Ponzano, Italy: Vianello, 2005), 90.

An Imperfect Understanding of Sculpture Marchesini’s and Rezzonico’s texts, aided by Gargallo’s responses, pitted and bifurcated the art of sculptural practice into two separate concerns, the intellectual and the physical. Yet, despite their reliance on well-known theoretical concepts in the history of sculpture, and for all the supposed attention to detail and the mechanics of sculptural production, none of the writers understood the process of working in marble very well. Each text obfuscated, whether deliberately or not, the multistep studio process of sculptural production. In and of itself, this was not surprising. Very few texts in the early modern period delineated the art of marble carving, which for generations had been a workshop activity whose trade secrets were to be protected and whose realities challenged the Renaissance idea of artistic genius. In his Vite, Vasari did outline the steps required to carve a marble block in a brief description, yet, in keeping with his idolization of Michelangelo, who both roughed out and carved the block himself, Vasari did not refer to the many studio assistants usually involved in the process.107 Benvenuto Cellini also only briefly touched on marble carving in his 1568 text on sculpture, dismissing as unnecessary the description of the tools used because “everybody in Italy, nowadays, knows all about these things.”108 Vincenzo Giustiniani’s short Discourse on Sculpture (ca. 1625–1630) was a rare exception. 107 See Giorgio Vasari, “Della scultura,” in Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori, et architettori, 6 vols. (Florence: Studi per edizioni scelte, 1966–1997), especially vol. 1, chapter IX, 87–92, and Vasari, “Vita di Buonarruoti Fiorentino,” in ibid., vol. 6, p. 3, line 16. 108 Benvenuto Cellini, The Treatises of Benvenuto Cellini on Goldsmithing and Sculpture, trans. C. R. Ashbee (1568; New York: Dover Publications, 1967), 137.

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In his text he refers not only to the sculptors, but also the “scarpellini” (stone cutters) and “intagliatori” (carvers) involved in the process.109 The only other significant Italian treatise of the time, Orfeo Boselli’s Osservazioni sulla scultura antica, from 1650, remained unpublished until the twentieth century.110 Later texts were equally nebulous, yet there were some notable exceptions. In keeping with the Enlightenment project, two illustrated treatises stand out—André Felibien’s Principes de l’architecture, de la sculpture, de la peinture et des autres arts qui en dépendent (1676) and, of course, Diderot’s Encyclopédie (1751–1772)111 (Fig. 1.14). The Encyclopédie was exceptional for including 30 plates which delineated in detail the tools and processes of working in wood, clay, bronze, and marble—even including particulars such as sculptors’ worktables (Fig. 1.15). It was not until 1802 that Francesco Carradori laid bare the entire process in a step-by-step illustrated treatise designed for scholars of sculpture112 109 Vincenzo Giustiniani, “Discorso sopra la scultura,” in Discorsi sulle arti e sui mestieri, ed. Anna Banti (Florence: Sansoni, 1981), 67–75. 110 Orfeo Boselli, Osservazioni sulla scultura antica: I manoscritti di Firenze e di Ferrara, ed. Antonio P. Torresi (Ferrara: Liberty House, 1994). 111 André Felibien, “De la sculpture,” in Principes de l’architecture, de la sculpture, de la peinture et des autres arts qui en dépendent: avec un dictionnaire des termes propres à chacun de ces arts (Paris: Jean-Baptiste Coig­ nard, 1676), book 2, 298–389, and Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds., “Sculpture,” in Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc., ed. Robert Morrissey and Glenn Roe, vol. 25 (vol. 8 of the plates) (Paris: Briasson, 1771; University of Chicago: ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, Autumn 2022 edition), vol. 20 (vol. 3 of the plates), http://encyclopedie. uchicago.edu/. 112 See Francesco Carradori, Elementary Instructions for Students of Sculpture, ed. Matti Kalevi Auvinen, Hugh Honour, and Paolo Bernardini (Florence, 1802; Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2002).

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(Fig. 1.16). His illustrations show a bustling studio, full of workers and assistants busy making clay models, both small-scale and full-size plaster casts, and assistants who roughed out the block. These scenes reproduce the activities that would have been present in Canova’s own studio. Individuals like Marchesini, Rezzonico, and Gargallo are to be excused for obscuring the real labor of sculpture. First, as several scholars of the history of sculpture point out, in the criticism of sculpture, it was unusual to describe technique in detail.113 Sculptural criticism more often focused on iconography, on decorum, and on the sculpture’s display, all things that were easier for viewers to both understand and communicate. Second, by not dwelling on sculptors’ physical activity, critics continued to evoke the paragone and reassert the medium’s intellectual equivalence to painting. Third, images of sculptors in their studio likewise obscured the real labor at hand. In France, for instance, depictions of sculptors’ studio often showed them modeling in clay—a material that was privileged earlier in France than in Rome—and often from a live model. Portraits of Houdon, for instance, show him surrounded by family and admirers and the occasional student drawing from the model; they do not, however, show him working on the marble block, nor do they show any studio assistants (Fig. 1.17). In Italy, in Rome in particular, the tradition was slightly different. The frontispiece of Bartolomeo Cavaceppi’s Raccolta d’antiche statue (1768) shows at least six busy sculptors, some of whom are using calipers 113 See Richard Wrigley, “Sculpture and the Language of Criticism in Eighteenth-Century France,” in Augustin Pajou et ses contemporains: Actes du colloque organisé au Musée du Louvre par le service culturel les 7 et 8 Novembre 1997, ed. Guilhem Scherf (Paris: Documentation française, 1999), 75–89; and Baker, Figured in Marble, 9 and 15–17.

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Fig. 1.14: Plate XLVIII in “De la sculpture,” from André Felibien, Principes de l’architecture, de la sculpture, de la peinture et des autres arts qui en dépendent: avec un dictionnaire des termes propres à chacun de ces arts. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Coignard, 1676, book 2, 313. General Collection. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University

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Fig. 1.15: Sculpture, différentes opérations pour le travail du marbre et outils, Plate I from Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds., Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc. Paris: Briasson, 1771. Vol. 25 (vol. 8 of the plates). Courtesy the ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, University of Chicago

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Fig. 1.16: Francesco Carradori, “Regole per cavare dalle misure qualunque lavoro di scultura,” Istruzione elementare per gli studiosi della scultura. Florence, [s.n.], 1802, pl. VIII. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

and plumb lines to measure a work for copying, others of whom are chipping away at marble blocks (Fig. 1.18). But unlike Canova, Cavaceppi’s claim to fame was not the production of new, “modern” works, but the careful restoration— resuscitation, if you will—of ancient fragments into completed wholes. There is only one drawing of Canova’s studio, to my knowledge, that faithfully reveals the sculptural process. Francesco Chiarottini’s drawing from about 1786 reveals the reproductive nature of Canova’s carving process, that is, his dependence on full-size plaster casts from which the marble was roughed out, and the slew of assistants who completed much of the grunt work (Fig. 1.19) Of course Chiarottini’s drawing was

completed early in Canova’s career; later images are more circumspect about the realities of the studio. Portraits from later in his career dispense with the chaos of the studio and intermediaries of both assistants and casts.114 There are far too many to describe here, but almost all tightly frame the sculptor and part of one of his works, around whom clay model, chisel, mallet, and marble chips all reinforce his solitary participation in each step of the production of his works 114 For a recent examination of Canova’s studio practice, including the work of his assistants, see Paolo Mariuz, “Lo Studio di Antonio Canova a Roma,” in Canova: Eterna bellezza, ed. Giuseppe Pavanello (Cinisello Balsamo, Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2019), 44–55.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 1.17: Louis Boilly, The Studio of Jean Antoine Houdon (1741–1828), after 1803. Oil on canvas, 86.3 × 105 cm. © Musée d’art, Thomas Henry, Cherbourg / HIP / Art Resource, NY

(Fig. 1.20). To show Canova otherwise, that is to reveal the workshop nature of the sculptural enterprise, would be to contradict the myth of the genius artist, for whom art is a passion, a vocation—not a business, or a job. This, of course, is yet another reason why critics of sculpture often elided the realities of the process. If erudite scholars did not understand the many steps involved in producing marble sculpture—or, if they pretended not to understand—it is no surprise the public did not either. If visitors who went to see Venus and Adonis

commented on Canova’s sculptural execution, they too were often stymied by the realities of the process. In a letter to Giannantonio Selva dated October 5, 1795, Antonio d’Este relayed an amusing anecdote that reflected poorly on one Neapolitan visitor. The gentleman praised the sculpture but then immediately mitigated his admiration by declaring, “beautiful, beautiful—but we too have sculptors who are capable of making a similar group, and in little time—maybe two months.” The gentleman’s comments may have been motivated by

Imagining Sculptural Prac tice

Fig. 1.18: “Studio di Bartolomeo Cavaceppi, ove sono state restaurate le statue contenute nella presente Raccolta,” frontispiece from Bartolomeo Cavaceppi, Raccolta d’antiche statue, busti, bassirilievi ed altre sculture restaurate. 3 vols. Rome: 1768–1772. vol. 1. Göttingen State and University Library (SUB), call no. 2 ARCH III, 695:1

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Fig. 1.19: Francesco Chiarottini, Canova’s Studio in Via San Giacomo, Rome, ca. 1786. Pen, watercolor, and highlight on paper, 38.5 × 56 cm. Museo Civico, Udine, Italy. © Ghigo G. Roli / Art Resource, NY

nationalist sentiment, but they betrayed his ignorance about sculptural production. His inability to understand the lengthy process of carving marble was mocked by d’Este, who replied “with great modesty that even Canova would have completed it in a month and a half, but my dear Sir, you see that there are two asses, and dealing with two asses takes some time.” To Selva, he then lamented, “I don’t want to admit such stupidity in our country, but curious remarks like these will certainly occur.”115 115 Letter from Antonio d’Este to Giannantonio Selva, October 5, 1795. La Biblioteca della Fondazione Querini Stampalia, VII. 104. m. 736. “Siamo si io che l’amica Luigia

quasi in colera con voi perche nulla mai ci avete scritto [proposto?] all’opera del nostro comune amico Canòva; e vero che sapiamo di più vi e il felice incontro di essa, ma ciò a noi non basta, lo vogliamo saper da voi, da voi vogliamo saper qualcuna di quelle istorielle che in tali incontri accadano. A Napoli mi son trovato presente a parrechie, e in verità vi assicuro che divertano molto: per esempio per darvi una idea delle sorte che colà ho inteso ve ne raconterò una. Il Gruppo di Adone e Venere (che avete certamente inteso ricordare) era posto in’opera; viene nel tempio un Sig.re di primo ordine e molto brogio appunto il primo giorno che si faceva vedere il Gruppo. doppo questa bestia di esser rimasto meravigliato della maniera facile con cui girava sopra il billico il gruppo esclamò =Bello=Bello ma anche noi abbiamo de scultori qui che sarieno capaci di fare un gruppo simile, e con poco tempo,—forse in due mesi. io allora non potendo

Imagining Sculptural Prac tice

Fig. 1.20: Photomechanical print after François-Xavier Fabre, Portrait of the Sculptor Antonio Canova (1812), 1880–1900. Original painting, Musée Fabre, Montpellier, France. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Miscellaneous Items, Washington, DC

These misunderstandings only increased in time. Towards the end of the eighteenth century and well into the nineteenth century, sculptors’ studios became an important stop on the Grand Tour, made more so, in part, by Canova’s increasing fame. The neat myth of genius that visitors encountered in written and visual accounts of the studio clashed with the chaos they found in Rome. For those viewers who may have been familiar with Vasari’s account of Michelangelo, who famously carved the block himself, seeing più stare alle [illegible] con tutta modestia risposi = anche Canova lo avria fato in un mese e mezzo, ma mio Sig.re Lei vede che i culi sono due e trattandosi di due culi vi vuole il suo tempo. Di simili cosarelle accadano, e non però divertano. Non voglio ammettere tanto stolidezza nel nostro paese, ma riflessioni curiose accaderanno certamente. Dunque scrivete qualcuna di esse che le vogliamo, tanto più che ora la amica nostra e partita in buona salute per la campagna.”

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Canova’s studio was a revelation. They were made aware that the art of sculpture could, at times, resemble an assembly line. For others who were perhaps more inclined to be skeptical about the art of this “new Phidias,” the activities of the studio supported the idea that Canova barely touched the sculptures at all. This was particularly true after 1816, when travel to the continent reopened after the collapse of the Napoleonic empire. Canova’s fame was at its height, as was the number of commissions he received; in turn, the number of assistants in the workshop led viewers to believe that “the actual work done by him is but little.”116 What visitors did see reinforced the idea that sculpture—at least, sculpture made by the “genius artist”—was divided into those two poles of invention and execution. If they were invited into the back of the workshop, the private space where only a few lucky visitors could go, they could see some of the small clay models (bozzetti) in which Canova worked out the preliminary three-dimensional design for his sculptures—all part of the process of invention. At the same time, he was sometimes present giving the marble the “final touch” for which he was so famous. As a result, visitors to the studio perpetuated the division reiterated by Marchesini and Rezzonico, focusing on the beginning and the end of the process, and bypassing the messy steps in the middle. It is a schism in our understanding of sculpture that remains to the present day.

116 John Mayne and John Mayne Colles, The Journal of John Mayne, during a Tour on the Continent upon Its Reopening after the Fall of Napoleon (1814; London: John Lane and The Bodley Head, 1909), 198.

2. Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns Abstract: Chapter two, “Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns,” focuses on Canova’s attempt to cement his legacy through the display of his Triumphant Perseus in relation to the Apollo Belvedere. The comparison was meant to highlight Canova’s innovative “imitation” of antiquity. However, the changing political circumstances from 1801 to 1815, the different locations in which this comparison took place, and the fact that the Apollo was present only as a plaster reproduction for much of the period not only resulted in shifting opinions about Perseus but also contributed to a change in attitude towards imitation in artistic practice. Once considered a fundamental and generative part of the creative process, imitation took on increasingly negative connotations as mere copying. Keywords: imitation, originality, Triumphant Perseus, sculptors’ studios, Vatican Museums, Louvre Museum

If the relationship of Canova’s Venus and Adonis in Naples inspired authors to reflect on sculptural production, the completion and display of Triumphant Perseus (1787–1801) in Rome enabled viewers to rethink the relationship between ancient and modern sculpture. When exhibited in both his studio and the Museo Pio-Clementino, Canova’s Triumphant Perseus was juxtaposed with one of the Vatican’s treasures, the Apollo Belvedere. The comparison allowed viewers to think more deeply about artistic training, particularly how artists selected their subject matter, determined the figure’s composition, and positioned their works in relation to those of their predecessors. At the same time, these juxtapositions, and the focus they brought to the antique objects and their legacy, also established the modern definition of “imitation” as a negative term.

Imitation as Creative Practice Sculptural practice, as we learned from Venus and Adonis, was often misunderstood by both critics and viewers who were ignorant of the complexities of the craft. Yet, if the technical and physical aspects of execution were confounding, so too was the process of invention itself. The conceptual process that lay behind artistic creation was often framed in terms of genius, with its concomitant emphasis on inspiration and spontaneity. What this emphasis on brilliance discounted, however, was the elaborate process of artistic training that was the true foundation for invention. Even if artists’ compositions were inspired by divine revelation, that revelation was grounded in years of study and preparation and was not born ex-novo. Moreover, the emphasis on genius threatened to negate the fact that modern works of art gained their prestige, in

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_ch02

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part, not because they were wholly “original,” but rather precisely because they often referenced great works of art of the past. Although sculptors often learned the technical aspects of their art from other family members (often their fathers), or in workshops and studios as apprentices, their education was based in part on the doctrine of “imitation.”1 The theory had its roots in Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy and by the Renaissance it was widely reflected in artistic and literary theory.2 The publication of Johann Winckelmann’s Reflections on the Imitation of Greek Works in Painting and Sculpture in 1755, followed by his History of the Art of Antiquity in 1764, disseminated the concept to an even broader audience and established Greek art as the paradigm of perfection.3 Winckelmann’s writings were subsequently translated into several European languages and were themselves only one example of reflection on the theme. Imitation was not intended as a culture of the copy—Winckelmann, at least, was quite explicit in this regard. 4 Imitation was meant, instead, as the creative interpretation of antiquity. Yet while copying was derided, there was an inherent tension between copying and imitation; in 1 For the history of artistic instruction, see Carl Goldstein, Teaching Art: Academies and Schools from Vasari to Albers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 2 James Ackerman, “Imitation,” in Antiquity and Its Interpreters, ed. Alina Payne, Ann Kuttner, and Rebekah Smick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 9–15. 3 Johann Joachim Winckelmann, Reflections on the Imitation of Greek Works in Painting and Sculpture, trans. Elfriede Heyer and Roger C. Norton (Dresden: 1755; La Salle, Illinois: Open Court, 1987), and Johann Joachim Winckelmann, History of the Art of Antiquity, ed. Alex Potts, trans. Harry Francis Mallgrave (Dresden: 1764; Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2006). 4 Johann Joachim Winckelmann, Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks, trans. and ed. Henry Fusseli (London: A. Millar, 1765), 256–257.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

practice, copying formed the foundation for success in imitation (and invention). Copying— classical antiquity, Old Master paintings, the live model—provided artists with the technical ability and repertoire of visual sources from which they could then engage their creative imagination and create a new—perhaps even “inimitable”—work5 (Fig. 2.1). Canova’s artistic training was equally influenced by these practices and theories. His drawings reveal intense study of the very antiquities that Winckelmann so vehemently praised. In many cases he studied classical sculptures from multiple points of view and carefully measured their proportions. Yet, like Winckelmann, Canova also made clear that copying these masterpieces into marble was not his intention. His vocation demanded more. He refused to make copies of the Apollo Belvedere and the Venus de’Medici for clients because exact replication did not require the intellectual engagement, or invenzione, to which he was particularly wedded.6 Even when he drew from a variety of sources, he knew that it was not enough to bring them together in a pastiche; recall his admonition to Quatremère de Quincy that artists needed to “absorb” into one’s “blood” both Greek style and “the beauties of nature” in order to create their own unique works.7 Imitation, in conjunction with, or conceived as a critical part of, invention, could lead the artist to creative heights and the production of what we might now term an “original” work. 5 Winckelmann, Reflections on the Imitation of Greek Works, 5. 6 See Christina Ferando, “Staging Neoclassicism: Antonio Canova’s Exhibition Strategies for Triumphant Perseus,” in Das Originale der Kopie: Kopien als Produkte und Medien der Transformation von Antike, ed. Tatjana Bartsch et al. (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010), 148–149, note 25. 7 Cited in Antonio Canova and Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Il carteggio Canova-Quatremère de Quincy, 1785–1822, ed. Giuseppe Pavanello and Fran­ cesco Paolo Luiso (Ponzano, Italy: Vianello, 2005), 90.

Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns

Fig. 2.1: Charles Joseph Natoire, Life Class at the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, 1746. Pen, black and brown ink, grey wash, watercolor, and traces of graphite over black chalk on laid paper, 45.3 × 32.3 cm. Samuel Courtauld Trust, Witt Collection, The Courtauld Gallery, London. Photo © The Courtauld / Bridgeman Images

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Fig. 2.2: Apollo Belvedere, second century CE. Marble, 224 × 118 × 77 cm. Cortile del Belvedere, Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. White Images / Scala / Art Resource, NY

After Canova’s move to Rome in 1781, and after the antiquarian community praised his Theseus and the Minotaur for its part in the classical revival, it is no surprise that his next great project, Triumphant Perseus, was devoted to confronting

the classical sculpture heralded as the wonder of the age, the Apollo Belvedere8 (Fig. 2. 2). Certainly 8 See Antonio Pinelli, “La Sfida rispettosa di Antonio Canova. Genesi e peripezie del ‘Perseo Trionfante’,”

Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns

Canova’s decision to emulate the Apollo, by far the most famous “Greek” sculpture of the time, was an assertion of his own place in the history of art, a justification of his claim to be the inheritor of antiquity, the “modern Phidias.” Canova’s resulting sculpture is often held up—for reasons good and bad—as the epitome of neoclassicism because of the way that it so clearly makes use of its ancient model (Fig. 2.3). The most notable transformation Canova wrought to the classical model was the change in subject, for Canova did not create a new Apollo, but selected a different mythological figure. When he began the work in 1787, Canova expressed some trepidation. It was a work meant for him, intended to be kept “secret” until it was finished; should he fail at his endeavor, if it remained unfinished, he did not want anyone to even know of its existence.9 In those early letters, shrouded in mystery, Canova never declared his intent to challenge the preeminence of the Apollo. Yet even if Perseus was not begun as a challenge to the Apollo per se, it certainly was understood as such once it was completed. In a letter to Canova dated August 12, 1801, for instance, his half-brother Giovanni Battista Sartori asked the artist, “Has Perseus therefore decisively triumphed over its so powerful rival? This victory is all the more honorable, because with the aforementioned work it was more diff icult to win a contest against an enemy Ricerche di storia dell’arte 13/14 (1981): 21–40, and Matthias Winner, “Paragone mit dem Belvederischen Apoll: Kleine Wirkungsgeschichte der Statue von Antico bis Canova,” Il Cortile delle Statue: Der Statuenhof des Belvedere im Vatikan: Akten des Interationalen Kongresses zu Ehren von Richard Krautheimer, Rom, 21.–23. Oktober 1992 (Mainz am Rhein: P. von Zabern, 1998), 227–252. 9 Undated letter from Canova to Giovanni Falier in Giovanni Gaetano Bottari and Stefano Ticozzi, Raccolta di lettere sulla pittura, scultura ed architettura scritte da’ più celebri personaggi dei secoli XV, XVI, e XVII, 8 vols. (Milano: G. Silvestri, 1822–1825), vol. 8, 173.

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to which the public’s opinion had remained enslaved for so many centuries.”10 Although Sartori does not mention the Apollo by name, he must be referring to that well-known and long-admired work. Johannes Myssok has argued that reception theory and the later political significance given to Perseus have overly determined the comparison between it and the Apollo Belvedere, arguing instead that Canova’s sculpture was heavily indebted to his now lost sculpture of Mars.11 Myssok is correct that reception history has transformed our understanding of Canova’s Perseus. However, we should not underestimate Canova’s cunning in selecting his subject, nor should we easily dismiss the Apollo as a source for Canova’s Perseus. By transforming the marble Apollo into a marble Perseus, Canova cleverly positioned his sculpture in relation to two great works in the history of sculpture, the Apollo Belvedere and Benvenuto Cellini’s 1545 bronze Perseus with the Head of Medusa (Fig. 2.4). By selecting a subject that had been famously employed by Cellini, Canova challenged the preeminence of Renaissance artists, particularly those Florentine sculptors who represented the apex of the craft in the 1500s. But by carving Perseus in marble, rather than casting him in bronze, Canova also deflected comparisons with Cellini’s technical bravura. Cellini, after all, deliberately employed bronze to flaunt his superiority to ancient sculptors, and, most importantly, to set his work apart from and improve upon that of Michelangelo.12 Canova’s 10 Cited in Antonio d’Este, Memorie di Antonio Canova, ed. Paolo Mariuz (Florence: Felice le Monnier, 1864; Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 1999), 424. 11 See Johannes Myssok, Antonio Canova: Die Erneuerung der Klassischen Mythen in der Kunst um 1800 (Petersberg: Imhof, 2007), 197–204. 12 See Jane Tylus, “Cellini, Michelangelo, and the Myth of Inimitability,” in Benvenuto Cellini: Sculptor,

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Fig. 2.3: Antonio Canova, Triumphant Perseus, 1787–1801. Marble, 235 × 190 × 110 cm. Cortile del Belvedere, Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. © Vanni Archive / Art Resource, NY

Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns

Fig. 2.4: Benvenuto Cellini, Perseus with the Head of Medusa, 1545–1553. Bronze, h. 550 cm. Loggia dei Lanzi, Piazza della Signoria, Florence, Italy. Pictures from History / David Henley / Bridgeman Images

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return to marble inserted him into the lineage of great Italian marble sculptors. His decision also reflected the celebration of marble by antiquarians and writers like Winckelmann, who set the period’s standards of taste and who responded directly to the abundance of marble sculptures being disinterred in contemporary excavations. Since so few ancient bronze sculptures survived, Canova’s use of marble also contrasted marble’s longevity to bronze’s transience and reaffirmed his self-awareness as the creator of classical works for the modern age; his Perseus might someday be heralded as a great antiquity by a future generation. Formally, however, Canova’s Perseus more closely resembles the Apollo than Cellini’s Perseus, and it is by comparison to this work that we can best understand the doctrine of imitation. That Canova had carefully studied the Apollo is clear from an engraving on which he carefully annotated the sculpture’s measurements (Fig. 2.5). At first glance, the formal similarities between Triumphant Perseus and the Apollo Belvedere—their similar heights, striding posture, outstretched arms, and even tumbling drapery—perfectly exemplify Winckelmann’s dictum that the only way for the modern era “to become great, or, if this be possible, inimitable, is to imitate the ancients.”13 Yet a careful look at Canova’s Perseus reveals the way he boldly modified the composition. Canova’s Perseus strides forward, liberated from the weighty stump that supports the left arm of the Apollo. Both stand with left arm outstretched, over which hangs drapery—one of the ways sculptors showcased their talent. In Canova’s case, however, the drapery acts like a sleeve, hiding Goldsmith, Writer, ed. Margaret A. Gallucci and Paolo L. Rossi (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 7–25. 13 Winckelmann, Reflections on the Imitation of Greek Works, 5.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

the join for the outstretched arm that allows it to bear the weight of Medusa’s head. This same drapery cascades to the floor, following the line of Perseus’ body and supporting the larger-than-life Greek hero. The drapery, in turn, liberates Perseus’ right arm. Freed from the supporting stump, Perseus holds his right arm out, the shoulder slightly dislocated by his open gesture and the mighty sword gripped in his hand. Only the strut that connects the right arm to Perseus’ upper thigh ruins the sculpture’s technical virtuosity. In the second version of the sculpture, made in 1808 for the Countess Valeria Tarnowska and currently in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Canova was more daring and eliminated the strut completely (Fig. 2.6). Transforming Apollo into Perseus therefore allowed Canova the opportunity to showcase his talent in the art of marble carving. At the same time, the change in subject clarified the narrative of the work. The precise subject of the Apollo Belvedere was hotly debated in the eighteenth century. His broken arms and the strap of a quiver across his back suggested Apollo was holding an arrow, but at whom was he taking aim? In the beholder’s imagination, the enemy’s identity is inconclusive, and the Apollo is forever destined to remain incomplete. In the case of Perseus, however, the identity of his enemy is unambiguous. Canova’s employment of this subject in stone, then, can be seen to improve the Apollo, for Perseus relays what the broken classical antiquity could not—a cohesive narrative. In Canova’s sculpture, victor and vanquished are united in one pose. The inclusion of Medusa also allowed Canova to grapple with, to both define and defy, the concept of ideal beauty (beau ideal) on which artists and theorists of the period were fixated. Here, again, Winckelmann’s theories prove a useful point of departure. Excessive musculature, for instance, was deemed inappropriate, and extreme displays of emotion were best

Reevaluating Ancients and Moderns

Fig. 2.5: Canova’s annotations (n.d.) on an engraving of the Apollo Belvedere, Plate 35 from Giovanni Volpato and Raffaello Morghen, Principi del disegno tratti dalle piú eccellenti statue antiche: per li giovani che vogliono incamminarsi nello studio delle belle arti. Rome: Pagliarini, 1786. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa

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Fig. 2.6: Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa, 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Fletcher Fund, 1967

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Fig. 2.7: Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa (detail), 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fletcher Fund, 1967

suppressed. Winckelmann thus praised the Apollo Belvedere largely because no evidence of violent action manifested itself in the deity’s face except the slight flair of his nostrils and the curled upper lip.14 Similarly, though Perseus grasps the decapitated head of Medusa, he too shows no emotion, despite looking squarely at his victim. It is Medusa, in contrast, who suffers (Fig. 2.7). Her open mouth hangs gaping as though she has just inhaled her last breath. Her eyebrows are furrowed, and the tension 14 Winckelmann, History of the Art of Antiquity, 204.

in her brow is exacerbated by the taut peak of her forehead, where Perseus grasps the mass of snakes that is her hair. Emotion, a negative trait, becomes aligned with the feminine; the ugly, the terrifying, and the feminine become inextricably linked. This morass of anguish, anger, and surprise would have been further enhanced by the tradition of looking at the work in torchlight and, more importantly, by Canova’s understanding of the way light could be used to animate Medusa’s expression. In his second version of the work, for instance, he sent Countess Tarnowska two

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Fig. 2.8: Antonio Canova, Perseus with the Head of Medusa (detail, illuminated), 1804–1806. Marble, 242.6 × 191.8 × 102.9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Fletcher Fund, 1967. © Christine A. Butler

versions of Medusa’s head—a hollow marble one, and a lighter one, made of plaster.15 The latter, he advised, could be placed on Perseus’ outstretched arm in lieu of the marble to protect the outstretched limb from breaking. The hollow marble, he wrote to her, “could be placed on a piece of furniture in one of your rooms, and if you wished, you could place a small candle underneath it to illuminate it in a play of transparency”16 (Fig. 2.8). Canova’s 15 Olga Raggio, “Canova’s Triumphant ‘Perseus’,” Connoisseur 129 (1969): 210. 16 As cited in Dominika Wronikowska, “Committenti polacchi di Canova. I Tarnowski e la ‘replica’ del Perseo,” Antonio Canova. La Cultura figurativa e letteraria dei grandi centri Italiani. 1: Venezia e Roma, ed. Fernando Mazzocca and Gianni Venturi (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2005), 85.

recommendation first and foremost reflects his talent as a sculptor, his understanding of the stone’s inherent properties, and his ability to carve the material to a nearly ethereal slenderness. At the same time, his suggestion reflects a visceral understanding of the sculpture’s subject. Medusa’s changeable expression would radiate passion and emotion—the very opposite of stillness—and ultimately defy the beautiful. Most importantly, however, the constantly changing, flickering light would create the illusion of movement and animation, giving her the appearance of life. Perseus therefore thematizes the issue of imitation, both thematically and formally. It self-consciously makes use of its ancient model even as the candlelight animates and resurrects Medusa, modernizing the sculpture and approximating some of the phantasmagoric

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entertainments that were becoming increasingly popular at the time. Yet there is also a certain playfulness here. In the mythological story, Medusa’s head of fiery snakes would turn anyone who gazed on her into stone. Perseus avoided this fate by looking at Medusa obliquely, in the reflection of his shield. After he beheaded her, he subsequently placed her head upon his own shield to immobilize his enemies. In his sculpture, Canova reverses our expectations. Medusa comes alive in the candlelight. Perseus looks directly at the head of the Gorgon; the hero has been quite literally turned to stone. Indeed, the similarity in scale between the heads of Perseus and Medusa and the way Perseus turns to ponder the head that is the “ur-creator” of sculpture establishes an uncanny mirroring. We cannot help but be reminded that Canova, as a sculptor, imitates the power of Medusa. Perseus allows us to see how the doctrine of imitation could shape an artists’ thematic and formal choices, while at the same time revealing the limits of theory in the face of artistic practice. Although imitation self-consciously looked to the past, to imagine imitation as monotonous or lifeless does it injustice. Canova admired and emulated past models, Greco-Roman and Renaissance alike—but he never simply copied their works. The past was never taken “as is.” It was, rather, always changed, modified, and redesigned in a fundamentally modern way. This dynamic understanding of the past transformed both viewers’ appreciation of historic objects and the contemporary works of art being produced. Historicism became one distinctly modern approach to the appropriation of the past.

so too were they influenced by their role as viewers of art works. They were beholders, museum visitors, and tourists. In these roles, artists were as conscious of and as influenced by the appearance of works of art—the encounter with the original object, their surfaces, and their settings—as they were by their formal, and informal, artistic training. Their experience viewing works of art helped shape their ideas about the form and display of their own works and the artistic concepts that they were elsewhere encountering primarily as philosophical theories. Canova’s experience emblematizes that of sculptors in late-eighteenth-century Italy. Although academic training was slowly becoming the dominant form of artistic instruction, particularly in the field of painting, many sculptors in Italy continued to learn the practical art of their craft through apprenticeships. Canova, like so many sculptors before him, was born into a family of sculptors and stonecutters, and then apprenticed to sculptors in Venice where he first encountered reproductions and plaster casts of ancient masterpieces and met the collectors and patrons who would so shape his career.17 By 1781, Canova moved to Rome, where his work was dramatically altered by his encounter with the art and artists of the Papal capital.18 In Rome Canova met other artists, patrons, and intellectuals and became part of a social world that would inspire new works of art. Most importantly, his work was profoundly shaped by the lessons he learned from his encounters with original works of art, their settings and displays, and the dialogue they inspired.

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17 Sergei Androsov, ed., Alle origini di Canova: Le terracotte della Collezione Farsetti (Venice: Marsilio, 1991). 18 See J. S. Memes, Memoirs of Antonio Canova, with a Critical Analysis of His Works, and an Historical View of Modern Sculpture (Edinburgh: A. Constable, 1825), 290–291.

If artists like Canova were steeped in the doctrine of imitation because of their artistic training and their role as producers of works,

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Seeing original works, rather than plaster casts, gave Canova a new appreciation for their form, their materiality, and their surface—in short, for their “objectness.” This was reinforced by Rome’s thriving art market and antiquarian culture. One of the pastimes of cultural elites was showcasing their knowledge about works of art, and this often involved assessing works of art in social settings to show off their connoisseurship skills. Sometimes these conversations occurred in private palazzi, at other times, in the new public museums. The Capitoline and the Pio-Clementino, founded in 1734 and 1771 respectively, provided a means by which the papacy could consolidate and protect the cultural patrimony of the Vatican See while strengthening cultural identity and nationalism, and they quickly became a popular destination for Grand Tourists and artists.19 As Jeffrey Collins has argued, museums responded to this influx of visitors by dramatizing the presentation of their objects and amending their architectural layout to employ grand vistas, long galleries, and semi-circular alcoves and focal points to draw attention to individual pieces.20 The institutionalization of these types of displays, formerly extolled in palazzi and gardens, affirmed both the presentation of the work and the works themselves. They also had a pedagogical function and taught visitors “the ‘correct’ aesthetic of academic classicism.”21 Tour guides led visitors through the museums via well-established routes, often via torchlight during nighttime visits, pausing in front of the 19 Christopher M. S. Johns, The Visual Culture of Catholic Enlightenment (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2015), esp. chapters 3 and 4, 127–198. 20 Jeffrey Collins, “The Gods’ Abode: Pius VI and the Invention of the Vatican Museum,” in The Impact of Italy: The Grand Tour and Beyond, ed. Clare Hornsby (London: The British School at Rome, 2000), 39. 21 Johns, The Visual Culture of Catholic Enlightenment, 145.

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greatest masterpieces and dramatizing visitors’ encounters with those objects.22 The social component of the visit was equally important, for part of the experience included pausing, reflecting, and admiring works of art in the company of one’s peers. Canova, too, was a beholder of these spaces and was also duly impressed by them. He marveled at the Greco-Roman antiquities of the Vatican Museums, which he declared far more beautiful than any casts he had seen, and he returned repeatedly to see the works in situ, including an evening visit where he admired the Apollo Belvedere and other works in torchlight.23 In turn, he adopted some of these exhibition techniques to great success. Doing so co-opted the clout engendered by the process of institutionalization and reflected his desire to endow still more authority on his own works of art. This was particularly true in the case of Perseus. Although Canova expressed some trepidation over the work when it was first begun, when it was finally completed in May 1801, he exultantly wrote to his patron Giuseppe Falier that “people comment on this statue so much that I hardly dare report to you what they say.”24 This was due, in part, to the adoption of techniques he learned in Rome, and particularly to the way he reiterated connections between ancient works and his own, modern one, creating a flourishing (if one-sided) rivalry which increased the value of his own work. 22 Claudia Mattos, “The Torchlight Visit: Guiding the Eye through Late Eighteenth- and Early NineteenthCentury Antique Sculpture Galleries,” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 49/50 (Spring–Autumn 2006): 139–150. 23 For Canova’s elation with the original works of art in the Vatican Museums, see Hugh Honour, “Canova’s Studio Practice I: The Early Years,” The Burlington Magazine 114.828 (March 1972): 156–157; and Antonio Canova, “I quaderni da viaggio,” in Scritti, ed. Hugh Honour and Paolo Mariuz (Rome: Salerno, 2007), 156, respectively. 24 Cited in Bottari and Ticozzi, Raccolta di lettere, vol. 8, 185–186.

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The Studio as Exhibition Space With his patrons, Canova often weighed in on his preferred placement of his sculptures. But there was no venue where he had more control than his own studio, which was not just a workshop, but also an exhibition space. This was true of sculptors’ workshops in Rome in general. When Canova visited Bartolomeo Cavaceppi’s workshop in 1779, he described it as “the studio, or, better said, museum,” due to the number of works in both marble and plaster that were on view.25 Cavaceppi’s studio, however, is a useful counterpoint to Canova’s. Cavaceppi was a well-known and popular restorer of works of art. He transformed fragments of antiquities into finished works of art, into complete, whole objects. He also kept casts in his studio which were themselves for sale, for the trade in plaster casts was a viable and profitable business. Yet as a young artist who wanted to make his way in the world and was earning a reputation as the new Phidias, Canova treated his studio differently. We already know he refused to make copies of works; he also refused to restore works. While his studio was full of plaster casts, like Cavaceppi’s, they were primarily models of his own works. These were intended to entice patrons to purchase new versions of his sculptures, but they were also working models which he would regularly revisit and sometimes alter before the final translation to marble.26 When Canova did exhibit plaster casts of ancient sculptures, they were not for sale and served a completely different function than those in Cavaceppi’s studio. They may have 25 Canova, “I quaderni da Viaggio,” 62–63. 26 Johannes Myssok, “Modern Sculpture in the Making: Antonio Canova and Plaster Casts,” in Plaster Casts: Making, Collecting, and Displaying from Classical Antiquity to the Present, ed. Rune Frederiksen and Eckart Marchand (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010), 269–288.

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been intended partly as educational tools and inspiration for the young sculptors in his workshop. More importantly, however, they served as a foil to his own sculptures, which the theorist and critic Carl Ludwig Fernow argued was regular practice for Canova.27 In 1801, for instance, Canova reiterated the formal similarities between Triumphant Perseus and the Apollo Belvedere by forcing a direct comparison between the two sculptures in his studio, exhibiting his marble work next to a plaster cast of the Apollo. Count Tiberio Roberti noted that a model of Canova’s Hercules and Lychas was displayed in Canova’s studio next to a cast of its prototype, the Farnese Hercules. This calculated comparison worked in Canova’s favor, for visitors preferred Canova’s Hercules to the ancient work 28 (Figs. 2.9–2.10). By staging these comparisons, Canova may well have been picking up on Francesco Milizia’s entry for exhibitions in his Dizionario delle Belle Arti of 1797, in which Milizia encourages artists to display their artworks next to well-established masterpieces.29 This, he claims, will inspire young artists to produce better work. Significantly, however, Milizia also explores how these comparisons affect not just the artists but the beholders of works of art as well. Juxtaposing two works renders the display more useful by combating the “ignorance” and “absurd judgments” that Milizia laments exhibitions usually engender.30 Canova therefore deliberately and intentionally manifested his work as a staging of 27 See Carl Ludwig Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova und dessen Werke,” Römische Studien (Zürich: H. Gessner, 1806), vol. 1, 24. 28 Tiberio Roberti, cited in Ferando, “Staging Neoclassicism,” 145, note 16. 29 Francesco Milizia, Dizionario delle belle arti del disegno estratto in gran parte dalla Enciclopedia Metodica da Francesco Milizia, 2 vols. (Bassano, 1797), vol. 1, 230. 30 Ibid.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 2.9: Antonio Canova, Hercules and Lychas, ca. 1795–1815. Marble, 350 × 152 × 212 cm. Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Rome, Italy. Scala / Ministero per i Beni e le Attività culturali / Art Resource, NY

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Fig. 2.10: Keystone View Company, One-half of stereograph showing the Farnese Hercules, National Museum, Naples, Italy, [between 1860 and 1930]. Photograph, Mount 9 × 18 cm. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, https://www.loc.gov/item/2020683026/

classicism in the modern era, which, in turn, called attention to the larger project of imitation within the space of his studio. His juxtapositions reiterated the creative practice that was a fundamental part of sculptural invention. Given sculpture’s potentially mechanical nature, the intersection between the theory of imitation and the space of the sculptor’s studio was an uneasy one. By showcasing his creativity, by

highlighting the similarities and differences to famous ancient models and reiterating that he was not directly copying them, Canova reinforced his own creative genius. At the same time, he distinguished his work as a sculptor from that of restorers like Cavaceppi, who were proficient in putting together fragments but did not necessarily invent new works of art themselves.

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By staging a comparison between Perseus and Apollo, Canova dramatized his own artistic skill, visually manifesting the argument that he was the greatest imitator of the antique. In the studio, the confrontation between ancient and modern masterpiece constituted a positive enactment of the doctrine of imitation. At the same time, the comparison between the two works directed the viewers’ attention, demanded their participation, and transformed the studio into a space of active viewing. He further engaged viewers by including a label next to the work explaining its iconographic details, linking the work to its mythological story and reiterating the sculpture’s archaeological accuracy.31 In the studio, therefore, Canova’s exhibition techniques emphasized the aesthetic importance of his work. Critical response, however, reveals that the exhibition engendered debates that not only addressed the complicated nature of imitation and artistic creation, but also the appropriateness of such exhibitions. Fernow, for instance, argued that the exhibition exemplified Canova’s lack of modesty by imposing a challenge to antiquity that was both “naïve” and “bold.”32 Not only did Canova dare his audience to compare the two works, but Fernow suggests Canova manipulated the display to enhance his own sculpture, placing Perseus on a higher pedestal than the Apollo and heightening its illumination.33 The work was even placed on a rotating pedestal turned by an assistant so viewers could admire it in the round.34 More 31 For the full text, see Raggio, “Canova’s Triumphant ‘Perseus’,” 212, note 31. 32 Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova und dessen Werke,” 25. 33 Ibid., 24. 34 Giovanni Gherardo de Rossi, Lettera di un amatore delle arti sopra una statua rappresentante Perseo, scolpita in marmo di carrara da Antonio Canova (Pisa: Società Letteraria, 1801), ix. For ease of reference, going forward, page references are from a recent reprint. Giovanni Gherardo

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damning, however, was the juxtaposition between marble and plaster. The juxtaposition inevitably made the Apollo look “wretched,” for plaster lacked the luminosity, warmth, and vibrant surface of marble.35 The contrast between media would have been accentuated by Canova’s carefully polished marble surface. One imagines this comparison would have put the Apollo at quite a disadvantage. When visitors saw the marble Apollo in the Vatican, after all, they applauded the sculpture’s refined materiality. Both James Simpson and Goethe commented on the semi-transparency of the Apollo’s marble, which seemed almost translucent in direct light.36 Goethe even credited the marble’s luminosity with keeping the god in the “first bloom” and “eternally young”—an effect, he stated, which was lost even in the f inest plaster cast of the work.37 Material did matter. In the studio, therefore, the “original” marble Perseus confronted a plaster reproduction of its model, not the authentic work itself. Within this comparison, the superiority of Perseus over the Apollo was established by drawing attention to the tension between the model and its imitation, de Rossi, Lettera di un amatore delle arti sopra una statua rappresentante Perseo, scolpita in marmo di carrara da Antonio Canova, in Biblioteca canoviana, ossia raccolta delle migliori prose, e de’ più scelti componimenti poetici sulla vita, sulle opere ed in morte di Antonio Canova, ed. Arnaldo Bruni, Manlio Pastore Stocchi, and Gianni Venturi, 2 vols. (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2005), vol. 1, 134. 35 Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova und dessen Werke,” 24. 36 See James Simpson, Paris after Waterloo; Notes Taken at the Time and Hitherto Unpublished, Including a Revised Edition—the Tenth—of a Visit to Flanders and the Field (Edinburgh: W. Blackwood and Sons, 1853), 151. 37 Goethe, Italian Journey, ed. Thomas P. Saine and Jeffrey L. Sammons (New York: Suhrkamp Publishers, 1989), 123–124.

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the copy and the original, the marble and the cast. If Fernow felt that Apollo’s association with Perseus glorified the latter work, other writers acknowledged that the comparison was potentially unflattering and even dangerous for Canova. One anonymous writer, identified as Gherardo de Rossi, published a small pamphlet in 1801, Letter from a Lover of Arts, Regarding a Statue Representing Perseus.38 In the text, a panegyric to Canova, the author recounts his visit to Canova’s studio and eavesdrops on one visitor’s reaction to Perseus. Confused and distraught to hear Canova’s work compared to the Apollo, the author is relieved when he “fortunately” sees that it was the plaster cast of the Apollo proper that inspired comment, rather than any intrinsic similarities between the two works.39 In fact, the author then spends a large portion of the text accentuating the differences between the two sculptures, namely their pose and dynamism. He goes so far as to say that any similarities between the two works must arise solely because the two artists have treated comparable subjects, heroes who have slain their combatants. 40 By distancing Perseus from its model and using the exhibition in the studio to stress differences between the two works, the author provides us with two different possibilities for the interpretation of imitation. On the one hand, for an eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century audience, subtle variations and distinctions between works were more important than 38 The authorship of this pamphlet is uncertain. Most nineteenth-century sources suggest it was written by Giovanni Gherardo de Rossi, but in a letter to Leopoldo Cicognara, Canova suggests it was written by Alessandro Verri. Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), ed. Hugh Honour and Paolo Mariuz, 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno, 2002), vol. 2, 822. 39 de Rossi, Lettera di un amatore, vol. 1, 132. 40 Ibid., vol. 1, 132–133.

what we might think of as glaring similarities. On the other hand, however, this attempt to distance the Perseus from the Apollo signals the way imitation held the dangerous potential to devolve into mere plagiarism. And plagiarism, it is important to note, is another criticism that Fernow leveled against Canova, disparaging Perseus as “nothing more, and nothing less than an Apollo disguised as and transformed into a hero, but in a different pose.”41 That creative imitation and inspiration could devolve into charges of plagiarism signals one of the greatest threats that occurred once a work was finally completed and displayed. The generative and creative power of imitation could be easily transformed into something negative in the eyes of the viewer; the very exhibition techniques with which Canova intended to increase the value of his works threatened to devalue them. The artist increasingly lost control over the way his work was interpreted, despite the way he controlled the viewing conditions of the work. In 1801, however, and in those early years of Perseus’ exhibition, responses to Canova’s work were generally positive. His strategy in the studio was a success, so much so that it led to a change in the statue’s exhibition conditions, for it subsequently entered the collections of the Vatican Museums.

Perseus in the Museum Within the space of the studio, Perseus challenged the Apollo’s artistic authority through the superior conditions of its display. The flattering exhibition conditions engendered primarily aesthetic judgments on the work of art. The aesthetic nature of the comparison, however, was muted in the face of historical events which 41 Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova und dessen Werke,” 196–197.

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Fig. 2.11: Jean Jérôme Baugean, Departure for France of the Third Convoy of Statues and Italian Works of Art, 1797. Etching, 45 × 60.6 cm (trimmed). © The Trustees of the British Museum

added a new political dimension to the works. After the French invasions of 1796, Pope Pius VI was forced to sign the Treaty of Tolentino in 1797 acknowledging the French victory in Italy. The treaty exacted a high price. The Papal States were forced to relinquish many of the Rome’s great works of art. French commissioners who had been charged with selecting only the best works of art quickly compiled a list of masterpieces to send to Paris. These one hundred works included Renaissance altarpieces, such as Raphael’s Transfiguration and Domenichino’s Last Communion of Saint Jerome, and ancient sculptures, such as the Apollo Belvedere, the Laocoön, and the Belvedere Torso, to name only a few. The works were packed, crated, and transported over the Alps in an engineering undertaking that was in and of itself remarkable (Fig. 2.11).

In Paris, they were paraded through the city on their way to the Louvre, where they formed the core of the recently remodeled museum—which was itself rechristened the Musée Napoléon in 1803 (Fig. 2.12). The number of exports of works of art from Rome, even before the French despoiled the city, had risen in the eighteenth century. But the invasions of 1796 most damaged the city’s cultural patrimony. Citizens throughout Europe objected to the wholesale spoliation of Italy, including Quatremère de Quincy, whose famous Lettres de Miranda (1796) argued that the entire city of Rome was itself a museum whose integrity should be protected. 42 The 42 See Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Letters to Miranda and Canova on the Abduction of

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damage, however, was not limited to the loss of objects. Across Europe, there was a perceptual and psychological shift in attitudes towards Italy and cultural patrimony on the peninsula; the idea that Italy’s treasures were up for grabs was permanent. Modern works were not immune to the threat. In Canova’s studio, for instance, foreigners supposedly argued over the appropriate destination for Perseus, citing among the possibilities, St. Petersburg, London, or even Paris, where it could accompany the Apollo. 43 It was precisely the prospect of the work’s loss that created a new national consciousness about cultural treasures, and the idea that Perseus might leave Rome sent the author of the Lettera di un amatore into despair. 44 The suggestion that Perseus could be displayed with the Apollo Belvedere in the Musée Napoléon meant that pairing the works seemed logical even outside the bounds of Canova’s studio. Despite the eagerness of those foreign visitors, however, Giuseppe Bossi, secretary to the Accademia di Brera, purchased Perseus for the planned Bonaparte Forum in Milan, a vast square meant to emulate the Roman Forum. The sculpture was destined to go there until Pope Pius VII refused to grant an export permit for the sculpture and purchased it himself. Perseus therefore remained in Rome and entered the collection of the Museo Pio-Clementino, a gesture which was well received by other Italians. Perseus was placed in the octagonal courtyard, the Cortile delle Statue, on the very pedestal that Antiquities from Rome and Athens, trans. Chris Miller and David Gilks (Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2012). 43 de Rossi, Lettera di un amatore, vol. 1, 140. 44 Johannes Myssok, “Die ‘Tröstende’ Kopie. Antonio Canovas ‘Neue Klassiker’ und der Napoleonische Kunst­ raub,” in Das Originale der Kopie: Kopien als Produkte und Medien der Transformation von Antike, ed. Tatjana Bartsch et al. (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010), 105–107.

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Fig. 2.12: Antoine Béranger after Achille Valois, The Entry into Paris of Works Destined for the Musée Napoléon, 1810–1813. Hard porcelain and gilded bronze, 127.2 × 84 cm, opening diameter, 64.9 cm. Manufacture et Musée Nationaux, Sèvres, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

had once held the Apollo, an unprecedented act that was an enormous honor for Canova. Although Canova reportedly objected to having Perseus occupy the abandoned plinth of the Apollo Belvedere, little is known as to who dictated its display within the museum.45 It is tempting to 45 In a letter to Canova in 1816, Cardinal Consalvi implies that Canova had originally objected to the

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speculate, however, that Canova intended Perseus to replace the Apollo, since an undated draft of a letter in the Archivio di Stato di Roma asserts that Canova had initially offered the sculpture to one of the Pope’s agents, Cardinal Litta, Treasurer of the Papal States, before agreeing to sell it to Bossi.46 However, according to the document, the Pope knew nothing of that initial offer, for Cardinal Litta acted “without his [the Pope’s] knowledge” and rejected the work based purely on “his own private feeling” and “his own opinion”—a fact which is repeated four times throughout the document. Once the threat of Perseus’ departure for Milan was known, “not even twenty-four hours passed” before the Pope expressed his desire to purchase that “rare production that was an honor to the age,” for, “after the immense loss of works of art that formed one of the principle ornaments of this capital, he knew that it was in his interest to obstruct [the sale], so that it [the city] would not remain deprived of this monument as well.” The fact that Canova had already sent a letter to Bossi offering him the work was “a mere accident,” and Bossi, “as a foreigner and private individual[,]” could not claim the right to purchase the work over the Pope. The Pope further justified his decision by arguing that eighteenth-century laws prohibiting the exportation of works of art could be applied not only to ancient works, but to modern ones as well. There are several ways to interpret this letter. Certainly, at least, by implying that Canova offered the work to the Pope soon after it was completed, the letter suggests that Canova hoped that Perseus could substitute the lost Apollo. More importantly, Canova may have understood that by offering the work to the Pope, the sculpture would enter the papal collections, and, therefore, placement of Perseus on the Apollo’s empty pedestal. Cited in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 1, 67. 46 Emphasis in the original. For the full text, see Ferando, “Staging Neoclassicism,” 156–158.

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the Vatican Museums. By this early date, Canova had already identified the power of the museum to endow a work with a broad viewing public, notoriety, and, of course, fame, better perhaps, than any other private or public domain. War disrupted travels across the peninsula, but the Peace of Amiens in 1802–1803 gave travelers from around Europe the opportunity to visit Rome and view the transformations to the city. Visitors to the Vatican Museums were struck by the absence of the great masterpieces they had come to associate with Rome. French visitors gloated over the absence of the works, describing their presence in the Louvre as the privilege of victory.47 Italians lamented the loss via biting and humorous pasquinades posted on the city’s “talking statues.” One exchange between Marforio and Pasquino played on Napoleon’s name. Marforio asked, “Is it true that the French are all thieves?” To which Pasquino replied, “All, no, but a good part [a Buona-parte].”48 British and American visitors were less sanguine. Joseph Forsyth, a British traveler touring the continent in 1802–1803, exclaimed in the Vatican Museums, “Who, but a Frenchman, can enter the present museum without some regret?”49 Reverend John Chetwode Eustace, a British traveler whose journal became a popular guide to the city, lambasted the French for the way they “laid their sacrilegious hands on the unparalleled collection of the Vatican, [and] tore its masterpieces from their pedestals.”50 He 47 See Lettres sur les principales villes d’Italie écrites à sa mère par le Comte D** en 1813 (Grenoble: F. Allier, 1828), 109–110. 48 Mario Fagiolo, Pasquino e le pasquinate (Milano: Aldo Martello, 1957), 237. 49 Joseph Forsyth, Remarks on Antiquities, Arts, and Letters during an Excursion in Italy, in the Years 1802 and 1803, ed. Keith Crook (Newark, NJ: University of Delaware Press), 111. 50 John Chetwode Eustace, A Classical Tour through Italy, An. MDCCCII, 6th ed., 4 vols. (London: J. Mawman, 1821), vol. 2, 58.

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Fig. 2.13: The Octagonal Courtyard of the Museo Pio-Clementino, showing gabinetti walls bricked up by Canova. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums

compared the French invasion to a “blast from hell [that] checked the prosperity of Italy in every branch and in every province.”51 Visits to the museums were fundamentally affected by the absence of these works of art. Indeed, the overall structure of the museum was altered to cope with the dearth of the originals. The octagonal courtyard, a highlight of the museum, had been remodeled in 1772–1773 by Michelangelo Simonetti, who had erected a portico to protect the sculptures and emphasize the niches in which they stood. These discrete views highlighted each individual work and called attention to its uniqueness, but once the originals were missing the vistas only emphasized the Papal State’s tragic 51 Ibid., vol. 2, 56.

loss. When Canova was elected Inspector General of the Fine Arts of the Papal States, he deflected attention away from the gabinetti in the octagonal courtyard. In 1803, he ordered the niches bricked up, in part to prevent visitors from immediately noticing the lack of the original works52 (Fig. 2.13). Visitors’ entire itinerary through the museum was affected. Forsyth, citing Cicero, explained 52 Paolo Liverani, “La nascita del Museo Pio-Clementino e la politica canoviana dei Musei Vaticani,” in Canova direttore di musei. I settimana di studi canoviani, ed. Manlio Pastore Stocchi (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2004), 97–98. Paolo Liverani argues that these walls were not built with the intent of hiding losses to the French since they were not taken down after the objects returned but were intended only to protect the works and illuminate them from above.

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that the guides who once used to talk about the marvelous works in the museum now spoke at length about their absence.53 More shocking than the want of the original sculptures was the fact that the niches and halls of the gallery did not remain empty. Plaster casts of the looted masterpieces—including the Apollo—had taken the place of the marble sculptures. This substitution disturbed visitors more than empty pedestals would have. Jean-Baptiste Reinolds, writing under the pseudonym Guinan Laoureins, for instance, remarked that “the Vatican had conserved only sad plasters of its masterpieces.”54 Eustace was stunned by the way the “absence” of these great works was “not so much supplied as rendered remarkable by the casts that now occupy their places.”55 The casts, therefore, seemed only to enhance the sensation of loss of the original works. As placeholders and reproductions, casts did not have the impact of the originals which travelers had come to expect and hoped to encounter. Within the Museo Pio-Clementino, therefore, Canova’s Perseus and the Apollo continued to confront one another. Although one might have expected that the introduction of plaster casts and the physical obstruction of the alcoves would have prevented people from making comparisons between works of art in different gabinetti, the comparisons between Perseus and the Apollo continued apace. Indeed, comparisons between Perseus and Apollo increased. From 1801 to 1815, with the Vatican Museums emptied of many of their treasures, visitors found solace in Perseus. Although the very same comparison between the marble Perseus and the plaster Apollo took place within Canova’s studio, in this 53 Forsyth, Remarks on Antiquities, 111, and editor’s note, 234. 54 Guinan Laoureins [Jean-Baptiste Reinolds], Tableau de Rome vers la fin de 1814 (Bruxelles: de Weissenbruch, 1816), 150. 55 Eustace, A Classical Tour through Italy, vol. 2, 59.

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context the comparison took on a quite different meaning. By confronting a reproduction of its model within this ideologically charged space, Perseus took on an important political significance. Triumphant Perseus became Perseus “the Consoler,” according to Leopoldo Cicognara’s moniker.56 In the absence of the marble Apollo, visitors judged the Perseus highly, reiterating the similarities between the two works. Forsyth, for instance, noted that “the statue of Perseus stands fronting the cast of the departed Apollo, and seems to challenge comparison. Like in sentiment, in occasion, and in point of time, Apollo has just shot the arrow, Perseus has just cut off the beautiful head of Medusa.”57 One anonymous commentator, reviewing a dissertation on the progress of the fine arts, juxtaposed French artists’ lack of talent—for they could only plunder works of art—with that of modern Italian artists, such as Canova, who had the capacity to make great art. Largely a back-handed compliment, for he disparages the Apollo for being an Italian rather than Greek work of art (i.e. a mere Roman copy of a Greek original), he nonetheless suggests that Canova is capable of making a work on par with the Apollo itself: “Canova trembles not at placing his Perseus in the nich [sic] whence the Apollo was dislodged: what should forbid that which has been done once from being done again?”58 Even Augustus von Kotzebue, the German dramatist and writer, admired the “capital statue of Perseus by Canova, which in my opinion makes up for a great deal of 56 Leopoldo Cicognara, Storia della scultura dal suo risorgimento in Italia fino al secolo di Canova del Conte Leopoldo Cicognara, 2nd ed., 7 vols. (Prato: Frat. Giachetti, 1823), vol. 7, 149–150. 57 Forsyth, Remarks on Antiquities, 111. 58 “Miscellanies, Art VI. Dissertations, Essays, and Parallels, 8 Vol. pp. 382 by John Robert Scott, D.D.,” in The Annual Review, and History of Literature for 1804, ed. Arthur Aiken (London: 1805), vol. 3, 655.

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what has been taken away, and may boldly assert its place among the best works of antiquity.”59 In the absence of the marble Apollo, and within this locus of cultural loss, therefore, comparison with the plaster cast served only to heighten the value of Perseus. Nostalgia over the missing, ancient patrimony intensified praise for Canova’s sculpture, and honor accrued to the new work on both aesthetic and political grounds. As one of the few “original” works remaining in the museum, and as the most prominent modern work, Canova’s Perseus became both a solemn reminder of the ancient works that had been removed from the Vatican Museums as well as a proclamation of the pre-eminence of Italy’s modern artists.

Changing Ideas of Cultural Patrimony It was the reaction of visitors to the looted objects within the space of the Louvre, however, that perhaps best reflects the way ideas about cultural patrimony were undergoing rapid transformation. The Musée Napoléon was packed with the most prestigious sculptures from not only the Italian collections, but those across Europe, for French rapaciousness was not limited to Italy alone. After the collapse of the Peace of Amiens, Napoleonic forces conquered more and more of Europe, and Vivant Denon, the director-general of the imperial museums, orchestrated the systematic dismantling of great collections throughout the continent, steadily sending works to Paris. The result was a collection that was unparalleled. The sculpture galleries of the Louvre had been redesigned and expanded to showcase the plunder to its best advantage. Organized around two, parallel central axes, one with a vista leading to the Laocoön and one to the Apollo, seven galleries 59 Augustus von Kotzebue, Travels through Italy in the Years 1804 and 1805, 4 vols. (London: Richard Phillips, 1806), vol. 3, 183–184.

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were filled with hundreds of works. The organization was not meant to highlight the teleological progression of the art of sculpture, however. As Andrew McClellan has shown, the commissioners charged with removing works from the Papal States—a list which soon expanded beyond the original hundred works denoted by the Treaty of Tolentino—had been instructed to obtain only the best works for the Louvre.60 The organization of the space therefore consisted of an overwhelming concentration of the most wondrous works of art, with periodic moments of repose.61 One can imagine, for instance, how breathtaking the sensation must have been to walk into a space and see before oneself Diana, Jupiter, the Discobolus, the Venus de’Medici and, beckoning in the distance, the Laocoön in the throes of agony (Fig. 2.14). Works which travelers had only read about or seen in prints or as casts, and which previously would have required months of difficult travel to multiple nations to visit, could be taken in at a glance. As Henry Milton tried to make his way to the Apollo, for instance, he was continually distracted by other “unpassable” works of art and was “almost oppressed” by his astonishment that “so many works of antiquity […] should thus be brought together in one rich assemblage.”62 Even within these vast halls, however, the most celebrated works of art were focal points, set apart from the others. The Laocoön, for instance, could be seen even from the entrance, enticing visitors into the galleries. The Apollo likewise stood apart at the end of a long gallery, flanked by large columns and elevated in a recess to which 60 Andrew McClellan, Inventing the Louvre: Art, Politics, and the Origins of the Modern Museum in Eighteenth-Century Paris (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 153. 61 Ibid., 151–153. 62 Henry Milton, Letters on the Fine Arts, Written from Paris, in the Year 1815 (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1816), 5, 19, and 3, respectively. Emphasis in original.

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Fig. 2.14: Hubert Robert, La salle des saisons au Louvre, showing the Crouching Venus, Diana the Huntress and the Laocoön, ca. 1802–1803. Oil on canvas, 37 × 46 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

led a small set of stairs—a veritable altar that isolated the sculpture for worship. Since so many visitors had recently seen many of these statues in other museums, and since the architecture of the Louvre had been designed to enhance the collection, viewers were very attentive to space and setting. Some were not at all bothered by the change of location. For them, the enthusiasm generated by the sculptures was timeless and would not be affected by the statues’ new location. Archibald

Alison, for instance, felt that the “general character” of the works was “universal”; they “excite the same feelings at the present time, as when they came fresh from the hand of the Grecian artist, and are regarded by all nations with the same veneration on the banks of the Seine, as when they sanctified the temples of Athens, or adorned the gardens of Rome.”63 Henry Milton 63 Archibald Alison and Patrick Fraser Tytler, Travels in France, during the Years 1814–15: Comprising a Residence

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was even more perspicacious. He responded directly to the criticisms of John Chetwode Eustace, the French’s greatest detractor, who was distressed by the way the works looked in the “dull sullen halls, or rather stables” of the Louvre.64 Contemplating Eustace’s dismay, Milton could not help but feel that the “effect” of these works could not be altered by their setting, which was soon forgotten by the viewer, or even by comparison with other works. Admiring the Apollo, for instance, he wrote, “the merit of the statue is intrinsic.”65 Other visitors, however, echoed Eustace’s sentiments. Some, such as Charlotte Eaton, felt the loss of these works of art would hamper artistic education. The difficulties encountered trying to see these works had been an education unto itself; more worrying was the fear that Italy’s loss of some of its strongest attractions would diminish the temptation to travel there entirely, preventing young artists from encountering works of art that were truly “unremovable,” such as frescoes.66 The sculptor John Flaxman was reputed to have said that the sculptures had “lost half their magic” as a result of their removal from Rome.67 For John Scott, the editor of the London Magazine, the statues became simply one of many tourist attractions in Paris. Before their arrival in Paris, he lamented: at Paris during the Stay of the Allied Armies, and at Aix, at the Period of the Landing of Bonaparte, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Edinburgh: Macredie Skelly and Muckersy, 1816), vol. 1, 131–132. 64 Eustace, A Classical Tour through Italy, vol. 2, 58. 65 Milton, Letters on the Fine Arts, 10–11. 66 Charlotte A. Eaton, Rome, in the Nineteenth Century; Containing a Complete Account of the Ruins of the Ancient City, the Remains of the Middle Ages, and the Monuments of Modern Times, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, 1820), vol. 2, 370. 67 As noted in Thomas Holcroft, Travels from Hamburg, through Westphalia, Holland, and the Netherland, to Paris, 2 vols. (London: Richard Phillips, 1804), vol. 2, 456.

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Each of these had before held an undivided empire, and drew wise men to worship them in their sacred recesses. But in Paris they were but as feeble auxiliaries to the Champaign of Beauvilliers, and the profligacies of the Palais Royal: they were included in the guides to the amusements of this gross city, along with the Marionettes, and the exhibition of a living hermaphrodite. Thus have objects, that formerly gave fame and attraction to a number of towns and spots of Europe;—which stood singly, or in small collections, fastened to their places by all that men knew of the past, or felt for the present,—which had connected themselves with the foundations of property, as well as with all received and cherished recollections and associations,—been violently torn away, packed up, and crowded together, to fill long tawdry halls, to give employment to a tribe of cleaners, keepers, and porters, and conversation to the mob of the most heartless city in the world.68

Scott could not bear the way these bastions of high art were now mere entertainment to Parisians and visitors alike. No longer the isolated subjects of attention and admiration, they were crammed together, merely one of many (low-class) amusements in the city. A close look at these divergent reactions, however—Milton’s on the one hand, and Scott’s on the other—reveals that something much more than mere irritation at display conditions is at work here. In effect, these opposing reactions reflect a working through of Walter Benjamin’s ideas about the “aura” of works of art over one hundred years before his seminal article was

68 John Scott, Paris Revisited, in 1815, by Way of Brussels: Including a Walk over the Field of Battle at Waterloo, 3rd ed. (London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown by A. Straham, 1816), 382.

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written.69 Milton, for instance, may have felt that the movement and displacement of the Apollo from its earlier position in the Vatican had no effect on the statue’s “intrinsic” power as a work of art, but Scott’s, Eustace’s, and Eaton’s reactions all reflected a nascent understanding that a change of setting could affect the impression rendered by an object. In fact, it was not simply the displacement of works that upset viewers— for, after all, works had been moved and taken as war booty for centuries—but, rather, it was the very congregation of them together in the space of the new universal museum that was so disturbing. Their uprooting and repositioning in a new environment, which brought together so many works of art from different times and places, effectively rendered physical the disruption that Benjamin felt occurred with the photographic representation of objects. The “cult value” of the works was destroyed by their translocation and inclusion in the Louvre. Many visitors realized this disruption would have long-standing implications for the display and reception of works of art. The idea that art objects on such a vast scale could be unmoored from their original locations—the sheer mobility of art works—shattered any sense that a work of art’s placement could ever be conceived of as permanent again. Ironically, however, this impermanence was not reflected in the French’s own discourse on the looted objects. Not only was the arrival of these works greeted with great public fanfare, processions, and triumphs, but works of art commemorating their arrival situated the pieces firmly within the context of the Louvre. Medals minted to celebrate the Laocoön’s 69 Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility: Second Version,” in Selected Writings, Volume 3: 1935–1938, ed. Howard Eiland and Michael W. Jennings, trans. Edmund Jephcott, Howard Eiland, and others (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2002), 101–133.

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and Apollo’s presence, for instance, show the two works within the museum’s long galleries, recreating the enticing vistas that had been produced by the museum’s architecture (Figs. 2.15 and 2.16). The Apollo stands proudly under the recessed arches, flanked by the many other masterpieces one would encounter on the way to see it. Over the portal to the museum, overseeing all of these treasures, is a bust of Napoleon, the “hero” who had obtained the works.70 The plinth on which the statue stood was likewise decorated with a plaque detailing the works’ movement from the Vatican to “here.”71 The French also celebrated their ownership over these masterpieces in the museum’s official catalogue, originally published by Ennio Quirino Visconti in 1800 and republished numerous times during the years the works remained in Paris, as well as other books that inventoried the great museum’s contents.72 It was Visconti’s catalogue, however, that reveals the French’s arrogant naiveté, for in the text describing the Apollo, it was proudly written that the Apollo stood in the Vatican “for three centuries, where it received universal admiration, until a hero, guided by victory, removed it to bring it and fix it forever on the banks of the Seine.”73 70 Antoine Michel Filhol and Joseph Lavallée, Galerie du Musée de France, publiée par Filhol, graveur, et rédigée par Lavallée (Joseph), 11 vols. (Paris: Filhol, 1814–1828), vol. 9, 11–12. 71 Filhol and Lavallée, Galerie du Musée de France, vol. 9, 12. 72 Musée du Louvre, Notice des statues, bustes et basreliefs, de la galerie des antiques du Musée Napoléon, ouverte pour la première fois le 18 Brumaire an 9 (Paris: P.-L. Dubray, 1811), 120. See also Filhol and Lavallée, Galerie du Musée de France, and C.-P. Landon, Annales du musée et de l’école moderne des beaux-arts; recueil de gravures au trait, contenant la collection complète des peintures et sculptures du Musée Napoléon … paysages et tableaux de genre, 4 vols. (Paris: C.-P. Landon, 1805). 73 Musée du Louvre, Notice des statues, 120. Emphasis added.

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Fig. 2.15: Jean Bertrand Andrieu after a design by Dominique-Vivant Denon, Medal of the Musée Napoléon (reverse), showing the Laocoön in situ. Bronze, 3.43 cm. Yale University Art Gallery, Transfer from the Yale University Library, Numismatic Collection, 2001, Gift of Dr. William Gilman Thompson, Ph.B. 1877. Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery

Fig. 2.16: Jean Bertrand Andrieu after a design by Dominique-Vivant Denon, Medal of Musée Napoléon (reverse), showing the Apollo Belvedere in situ, with a small bust of Napoleon over the arch, 1804. Gold, 3.2 cm. Bibliothèque nationale de France

Not surprisingly, the self-assurance with which the French made this claim irritated some foreign visitors. They were astounded that the French could not recognize that the Apollo’s position in the Louvre could well be fleeting. John Scott was shocked that “the French coxcombs dare to speak and write about destiny decreeing to France from eternity and perpetuity, these immortal works of genius! What Rome could not preserve, they flatter themselves Paris can, and the triumph which has been denied to the Capitol, they assign by anticipation to the Palais Royal.”74 James Forbes “could not forget” that he had seen these masterpieces in Rome and Florence.75 Responding to the French

claim the Apollo would remain in Paris forever, he retorted, “So much for the Apollo.”76 Henry Redhead Yorke was more explicit, noting, “This “for ever” is very problematical. It is not improbable, that it [the Apollo] may decorate the future National gallery of the empire of Botany Bay. There is nothing like the rotatory motion of the circle of causation, which none but the learned members of the National Institute understand. It is an Eleusinian mystery.”77 J. G. Lemaistre also chimed in. Although he could not compare the Apollo’s placement in the Louvre to its situation in Rome, having not seen it there himself, he was aware of the permanent disarticulation that had occurred between the Apollo and any fixed location:

74 John Scott, A Visit to Paris in 1814: Being a Review of the Moral, Political, Intellectual, and Social Condition of the French Capital, 2nd ed. (London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1815), 245. 75 James Forbes, Letters from France, Written in the Years 1803 & 1804, Including a Particular Account of

Verdun and the Situation of the British Captives in That City (London: J. White, 1806), 241. 76 Ibid., 412. 77 Henry Redhead Yorke, Letters from France, in 1802, 2 vols. (London: H. D. Symonds, 1804), vol. 2, 103, note.

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I hope, my friend, you admire the modesty with which it is declared, that the Apollo is forever fixed on the banks of the Seine! After the singular fate which this statue has experienced, it required all that happy confidence, with which the french [sic] determine the most difficult questions in their own favour, to make so bold an assertion. The Apollo lay two thousand years under the ruins of Antium, and yet preserved its beauty. It was drawn thence, placed in the Vatican, and after receiving there, for three centuries the applauses of mankind, is carried over the Alps, and seen at Paris in all its original symmetry. If it be the destiny of this matchless figure to follow the tide of fortune, and to change its residence with the changes of empire, and the casualties of human affairs, who shall decide where it may next be found? If Julius II, when he placed the Apollo in the Vatican, had been told, that, three hundred years afterward, a French warrior would attach it to his car of victory, in entering the city of Paris, would even the pope himself have had faith enough to believe such a prophecy? After this, no conjecture becomes improbable. Who knows that this celebrated statue may not, some centuries hence, be discovered on the frozen plains of Siberia, or in the burning sands of Egypt?78

The idea of the potential transitory nature of a work of art’s setting, therefore, was embedded in the very status of the Apollo as a trophy and the dislocations it had undergone. In the Louvre, viewers admired works with which they had long been familiar, but they did so with a new awareness of the way those works functioned in relation to the setting and space around them. 78 J. G. Lemaistre, A Rough Sketch of Modern Paris, or Letters on Society, Manners, Public Curiosities, and Amusements in that Capital Written during the Last Two Months of 1801 and the First Five of 1802, 2nd ed. (London: J. Johnson, 1803), 20–21.

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Even as they were conscious that a work of art’s placement might be temporary, they were likewise cognizant that an object, however transportable, might have a “secret sympathy” with the place where it had been originally displayed and the nature, architecture, and other immoveable works of art in that primary location.79

Imitation as Plagiarism No one, perhaps, was better aware of how placement could affect a work of art than Canova himself, as evidenced by the careful staging of Perseus in his studio and his desire to see it placed in the Vatican. Although Canova was not opposed to the concept of the museum per se, having himself admired so many works of art in both the Vatican and the Capitoline Museums, he could not have relished seeing so many of the treasures that had provided him with artistic inspiration uprooted and placed in the new universal museum of the Louvre. He was certainly deeply pained by the havoc the French created in Rome and returned to Possagno for a year in 1798–1799 because he could not bear to remain in the city while it was being plundered. His despondency was well known enough to be remarked on in travelers’ accounts.80 It seems fitting, then that after Napoleon was defeated in the Battle of Waterloo, many of the Papal treasures were returned to Rome through the aid of Canova himself.81 Canova even earned 79 Helen Maria Williams, A Narrative of the Events Which Have Taken Place in France, from the Landing of Napoleon Bonaparte, on the 1st of March 1815, until the Restoration of Louis XVIII, with an Account of the Present State of Society and Public Opinion (London: John Murray, 1815), 365–366. 80 Holcroft, Travels from Hamburg, vol. 2, 284 and 456, respectively. 81 For more on Canova’s role in the repatriation of these works of art, see Christopher M. S. Johns, Antonio Canova and the Politics of Patronage in Revolutionary and

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Fig. 2.17: The French Artist Mourning the Chances of War, 1815. Colored etching. Bibliothèque National de France, Cabinet des Estampes et de la Photographie, Collection Hennin, Inv. no. 13832, Paris

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Fig. 2.18: Pietro Paoletti, Canova Presenting to Pius VII the Monuments of Italian Glory Recovered from Paris in the Vatican State in 1814. Drawing, 25.4 × 34.5 cm. Gabinetto dei Disegni e delle Stampe, Album Cicognara, A. 77, n. 44, Museo Correr, Venice. 2022 © Photo Archive – Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia

the nickname “l’emballeur [the packer]” by livid Frenchmen, who refused to address him by his title of “l’ambassadeur [Ambassador].”82 The removal of the most important statues was fraught with tension, anger, and disappointment on the part of the Parisians, particularly the artists, who were caricatured sobbing in front of the empty museum (Fig. 2.17). Crowds came out in full force to see the dismantling of the collection. Napoleonic Europe (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 171–194. 82 Ibid., 185.

No longer were the Vatican’s treasures to remain “forever” fixed on the banks of the Seine. Despite French opposition, Canova was successful in securing not only the return of the many works, but even obtained funding from the British to pay for their shipment back to Rome. Upon their arrival in the papal city, great fanfare and enthusiasm were expressed by the public. Canova was hailed as the restorer of the arts. Prints and medals circulated, celebrating his return. One stunning drawing by Pietro Paoletti depicted him presenting the Laocoön, Apollo, Torso Belvedere, and the Transfiguration to Pius VII, himself only

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Fig. 2.19: James Anderson, Museo Chiaramonti, ca. 1857–1875. Albumen print, 20 × 25.7 cm. Part of a photo album of 57 photographs of works of art, mostly from the Vatican Museums. Gift of J. P. Filedt Kok, Amsterdam. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

recently restored to full authority after his return from exile in May 1814 (Fig. 2.18). The Pope also honored Canova’s success by bestowing on him the title of the Marchese d’Ischia and providing him with an annual income of 3,000 scudi. The celebrations, however, did not stop with these personal honors. In 1816, in his official capacity as Inspector General of the Fine Arts, Canova commissioned a series of lunettes to decorate the Galleria Chiaramonti, part of the new Museo Chiaramonti which had been founded in 1806 and filled with recently excavated works.83 83 See Ulrich Hiesinger, “Canova and the Frescoes of the Galleria Chiaramonti,” The Burlington Magazine 120.907 (Oct. 1978): 654–665.

Intended in part to replace some of the works taken to Paris, the gallery had been installed by Canova himself and opened to the public in 1810. Groups of busts intermingle with larger statues along the corridor, promoting the examination of individual pieces while also inviting comparisons and establishing a broader context for the works (Fig. 2.19). Canova commissioned young Italian and German artists to fresco the fifteen lunettes that punctuate the bays of the 390-foot-long gallery. He paid them 3,000 scudi—the very amount that had been given to him as an honorarium by Pius VII. The theme of the lunettes was intended to honor Pius VII’s generosity as a patron of the arts, but several of the lunettes either directly or indirectly refer to the repatriation of the looted

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Fig. 2.20: Francesco Hayez, Allegory of the Return to Rome of the Works Plundered from the Papal States, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Scala / Art Resource, NY

masterpieces. One, for instance, the Recovery of Works of Art Taken from Rome, by Francesco Hayez, showcases the homecoming of the objects (Fig. 2.20). Two putti point to a caravan transporting crates into Rome, reversing the act of departure that had been celebrated by the French in a print from 1798, almost twenty years before. In the foreground, a bust of William Richard Hamilton (1777–1859), the British Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, pays homage to the role he had in the negotiations with the restored French monarchy for the return of the objects. The inclusion of Hamilton’s portrait as a bust not only recalls the busts of Roman emperors that had been looted by the French and returned to Rome, but also alludes, of course, to the portraits that line the walls of the Galleria Chiaramonti itself. Finally, an allegorical figure of the Tiber looks on, and one cannot help but note the similarities

between the way that figure is represented and the ancient sculpture of the Tiber—one of the few works that was left behind in Paris. Even the more ostensibly allegorical frescoes, Sculpture Honored, by Francesco Hayez, and Painting Honored, by Giovanni Demin, recall the recent political events. In Sculpture Honored an allegorical female figure representing the art holds a clay modeling tool (Fig. 2.21). Chisel and hammer rest beside her. She admires the Bust of Jupiter—a work that at the time had been thought to be by Phidias and which had been displayed in the Louvre in the Salle de Laocoön. 84 Painting Honored, on the other hand, shows an allegorical figure of painting 84 See Louvre, Notice des statues, 96, and Filhol and Lavallée, Galerie du Musée de France, vol. 5, 7–8 and plate vi.

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Fig. 2.21: Francesco Hayez, Sculpture Honored, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums

seated in front of what certainly was the most famous piece of war booty taken by the French—Raphael’s Transfiguration (Fig. 2.22). In these lunettes, therefore, Canova reiterated the link between works of art and their settings. He celebrated their return to Rome, embedding into the very walls of the museum the image of its most important pieces and their homecoming. Canova thus ensured that generations of visitors to come would recall the long journey these works of art had made from Paris to Rome to be restored to their rightful location. For most people, however, the memory of looting was distasteful. It left a bitter taste for Romans and non-Romans alike. When Charlotte Eaton

met Pope Pius VII, his anger was clear, for he felt that the damage the French had done could never be repaired.85 That the Papal States had suffered extraordinary economic, cultural, and personal losses is certain. Perhaps even more interesting, however, is the way the French seizure of works of art fundamentally altered the way people conceived of the Vatican Museums themselves. Eaton, for instance, confessed that she had never even heard of the Vatican Museums before her arrival in Rome.86 On the one hand, Eaton’s 85 For an account of their conversation, see Eaton, Rome, in the Nineteenth Century, vol. 3, 120–123. 86 Ibid., vol. 1, 149–150.

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Fig. 2.22: Giovanni Demin, Painting Honored, 1817. Fresco, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Photo copyright © Governorate of the Vatican City State-Directorate of the Vatican Museums

statement reflects the way the Louvre’s notoriety both eclipsed the fame and damaged the memory of the museums in Rome. Eaton, after all, was born in 1788 and for most of her young adult life the Louvre was the most celebrated museum in the world. On the other hand, however, her comment also implies that people did not think of the Vatican collections as a museum in the same sense until they had had the experience of the Louvre. The universal nature of the Louvre created, to a degree, the modern idea of the museum, which in turn caused people to view the Vatican in a different light. Visitors could not help but then compare the Vatican to the Louvre itself and consider it in these new terms. Part of the lesson visitors to the Louvre had learned was, of course, that the link between art

object and site could be easily broken. In these new museums, works of art were mobile and unrooted; the connection between them and their setting could no longer be guaranteed or taken for granted. It was this idea that permanently altered the way visitors—and Romans themselves—perceived the Vatican. Indeed, perhaps there are no images more poignant than the medals that were minted by the Papal State in honor of the return of the looted works of art. One paired Pius VII and the Laocoön; the other, Canova and the Apollo Belvedere87 (Fig. 2.23). Despite the fact that both works of art had 87 See Cesare Johnson, “Avvenimenti e personaggi di Antonio Canova in medaglie,” Medaglia Torino 9.16 (1981): 32–33.

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Fig. 2.23: Salvatore Passamonti, Medal commemorating the return of looted objects, showing Canova (recto) and the Apollo Belvedere (verso), 1816. Bronze, 6.76 cm. Yale University Art Gallery, Transfer from the Yale University Library, Numismatic Collection, 2001, Gift of Dr. William Gilman Thompson, Ph.B. 1877. Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery

been reinstated to their place of honor, pedestal prominently visible, both works float against a blank background. Unlike the French medals, which heralded the placement of the Apollo and the Laocoön in the Louvre, the empty void in which they are situated reflects the impossibility of imagining the works permanently embedded within the setting of the Vatican. These conceptual shifts had long-term effects on the way people viewed works of art in the Vatican Museums. Inevitably, upon their arrival in Rome, visitors remembered seeing the ancient sculptures in the Louvre in recent years and made comparisons between the ways they were displayed. Some visitors were dismayed at their presence in the Vatican, which they thought poorly maintained.88 Most, however, were thrilled to see the works in their rightful places. One Frenchman was able to look beyond 88 See Henry Sass, A Journey to Rome and Naples, Performed in 1817; Giving an Account of the Present State of Society in Italy, and Containing Observations on the Fine Arts (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1818), 119.

nationalistic fervor and agreed that “in the Louvre, the Apollo was a mere sculpture: he became a God in the Vatican.”89 Felicia Hemans thought the arrival of the works was a portent of Rome’s resurgence and recorded her ecstasy in a poem, exclaiming “Then from the sacred ashes of the first/Might a new Rome in phoenix grandeur burst!”90 After the return of the works of art from Paris in 1816, the Apollo Belvedere was reinstated to its pedestal while Canova’s Perseus and his boxers, Creugas and Damoxenes, were removed to a nearby alcove. In fact, in what seems like an ironic gesture from our perspective, Perseus was placed on the pedestal and in 89 Joseph Hippolyte de Santo-Domingo, Tablettes romaines, contenant des faits, des anecdotes et des observations sur les moeurs, les usages, les ceremonies, le gouvernement de Rome; par un français qui a récemment séjourné dans cette ville (Paris: Chez les Marchands de Nouveautés; Imprimerie de Guiradet, 1824), 113–114. 90 Felicia Dorothea Hemans, “The Restoration of the Works of Art to Italy, 1816,” in The Poetical Works of Felicia Dorothea Hemans (London: Oxford University Press, 1914), 663.

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the same alcove that the cast of the Apollo had occupied in the marble’s absence.91 Once this relocation occurred, the unexpected, negative consequences of incorporating Perseus into the Vatican collections emerged. Visitors’ perceptions of Perseus were transformed because of their heightened awareness of the relationship between works of art and their setting. They were even more cognizant of Perseus’ placement within the Vatican and its relationship to the ancient masterpieces surrounding it. The return of the “original” marble Apollo and the dislocation of Perseus from its place of honor to the pedestal that had held the Apollo’s cast signaled the work’s demotion. It was little more than a superfluous placeholder, a replacement which, like the plaster cast of the Apollo itself, was no longer needed.92 Visitors expressed this new understanding of the works’ relationship one to another; they emphasized the differences between the works in a comparison that was ultimately detrimental to Canova. Johann Kiesewetter could not understand why anyone would even want to establish a parallel between the two sculptures.93 Another German author, Hermann Friedländer, traveling in 1815–1816, was disappointed by the juxtaposition between Canova’s modern works and ancient sculptures, describing their placement in the Museo Pio-Clementino in detail: 91 Letter from Ercole Consalvi to Canova on January 28, 1816 in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 1, 68. 92 The cast of the Apollo Belvedere was subsequently purchased by John Scandrett Harford. See the Harford Family Papers at the Bristol Record Office, Bristol, United Kingdom, documents 28048 C68/1 and 28048 C68/2. With thanks to Catherine Roach for bringing this document to my attention. 93 Johann Gottfried Kiesewetter, Reise durch einen Theil Deutschlands, der Schweiz, Italiens und des Südlichen Frankfreichs nach Paris. Erinnerungen aus den Denswürdigen Jahren 1813, 1814, und 1815, 2 vols. (Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1816), vol. 2, 328, note.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

It [a central fountain] is surrounded by an octagonal portico, supported by 16 columns of granite, and filled with sarcophagi, antique bathing-apparatus, and other curious sculptures. The first of the four rooms underneath contains the statue of Antinous Belvidere; the second and third, the Vaticanus Apollo, and the groups of the Laocoon, and the last—the Perseus and two Gladiators, by Canova, together with his bust. This strange exhibition is now the more inexcusable as all the originals are returned, and the Apollo needs no longer to be represented by the smooth Perseus. But it does not tend to Canova’s honour either, since there cannot be a greater contrast than there is between the flimsiness and sweetness of his f igures and the grand energy of the antiques.94

John Scott thought the comparison “a reward indeed for Canova. […] Lightness, expression, and air, are the merits of the Apollo; soul, form, and look, all going off together in an air of indignant triumph. Go back again to Canova’s Perseus, and you will see at once the imitation, and the (not failure) but inferiority.”95 Hugh William Williams, traveling in 1816, likewise pointed out that “Canova is much beholden to the Apollo for [the Perseus]; indeed, it is a palpable 94 Herman [sic] Friedländer, Views in Italy, during a Journey in the Years 1815–1816 (London: Sir Richard Phillips, 1821), 108. Although I have cited the English translation from 1821 here, in the original German, the text is even more biting. Friedlander includes a parenthetical expression of amazement that Canova’s Perseus and Boxers are in the museum. “Can you believe it?” he writes. See Hermann Friedländer, Ansichten von Italien, Während einer Reise in den Yahren 1815 und 1816, 2 vols. (Liepzig: F. M. Brodhaus, 1820), vol. 2, 147. 95 John Scott, Sketches of Manners, Scenery, &c, in the French Provinces, Switzerland, and Italy. With an Essay on French Literature (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1821), 370.

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imitation.”96 Louis Simond, also traveling in 1817–1818, complained Perseus “is perhaps too close an imitation of the Belvedere Apollo,” while Edward Buron and Friedrick Sickler were more convinced that the sculpture was a “certain imitation of the Apollo.”97 Even Charlotte Eaton, who was fond of Canova and his works, suggested that “[t]o turn from the contemplation of the Apollo to look on any other sculpture, ancient or modern, is exposing it to a fearful test and the Perseus unfortunately recalls to us, with peculiar force, the image of that inimitable work.”98 Although Eaton does mitigate her censure, ultimately declaring Perseus to be “an honour to modern statues,” these criticisms imply that the positive model of imitation as a creative force was rapidly losing its hold by 1816.99 Indeed, some visitors referred to Perseus as a mere copy of the Apollo. Jane Waldie adored Canova’s female figures but found his males to suffer in comparison. She decried “his Perseus […] which is almost a copy from the Apollo—how inferior to that heaven-descended God!”100 In 1818 Toussaint von Charpentier was scandalized by Canova’s “boldness” and “impertinence” for

exhibiting his modern works in the museum.101 Perseus might be “the best” of the three sculptures, but “the good in him is only a copy of the Apollo.”102 James Galiffe found him “handsome,” but added Perseus “has too much the appearance of having been copied from the Apollo who stands in the adjoining compartment.”103 Henry Matthews put it even more bluntly: “It is a pity that Canova’s works are placed in the Vatican. The Perseus might have attracted admiration while the Apollo was at Paris, but the Apollo is come back; and who could ever tolerate a copy by the side of the original?”104 Since Perseus was no longer substituting for the Apollo, therefore, viewers could be more critical of what they perceived as the sculpture’s flaws and aesthetic failures. Similarities to the Apollo, which just fifteen years previously heightened its value, now denigrated the work. Within this second comparison in the Vatican, therefore, the confrontation between Perseus and Apollo enacted the idea of the imitation as a negative term. This was brought out symbolically by the Vatican officials themselves. Although they may have intended to honor the statue by placing it on the plinth the cast of the Apollo had occupied, they inadvertently

96 Hugh William Williams, Travels in Italy, Greece, and the Ionian Islands. In a Series of Letters, Descriptive of Manners, Scenery, and the Fine Arts, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: A. Constable, 1820), vol. 2, 13. 97 Louis Simond, A Tour in Italy and Sicily (London: Longman, Reese, Orme, Brown and Green, 1828), 220–221, and Edward Burton and Friedrich Sickler, Rom und Latium, von Burton und Sickler: nach den neuesten Forschungen (Weimar: Landes-Industrie-Comptoir, 1823), vol. 1, 596, respectively. 98 Eaton, Rome, in the Nineteenth Century, vol. 1, 172–173. 99 Ibid., vol. 1, 173–174. 100 Jane Waldie, Sketches Descriptive of Italy in the Years 1816 and 1817 with a Brief Account of Travels in Various Parts of France and Switzerland in the Same Years, 4 vols. (London: John Murray, 1820), vol. 2, 322.

101 Touissant von Charpentier, Bemerkungen auf einer Reise von Breslau über Salzburg, Tirol und der Südlichen Schweiz nach Rom, Neapel und Paestum im Jahre 1818, 2 vols. (Leipzig: G. J. Göschen, 1829), vol. 2, 132. 102 Ibid., vol. 2, 132. 103 Jacques Augustin Galiffe, Italy and Its Inhabitants: An Account of a Tour in That Country in 1816 and 1817: Containing a View of Characters, Manners, Customs, Governments, Antiquities, Literature, Dialects, Theatres, and the Fine Arts; with Some Remarks on the Origin of Rome and of the Latin Language, 2 vols. (London: J. Murray, 1820), vol. 1, 250. 104 Henry Matthews, The Diary of an Invalid, Being the Journal of a Tour in Pursuit of Health, in Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, and France, in the Years 1817, 1818, and 1819, 5th ed. (Paris: A. and W. Galignani, 1836), 94–95.

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promoted and reaffirmed the negative reactions of visitors who demoted the work’s status. At the same time, the confrontation of these two originals and the juxtaposition between the “smooth” marble surface of Canova’s work with the rougher stone of the more venerable antiquity likewise reminded visitors of the modernity of Canova’s work. It was a usurper in the museum. Finally, the transformations in language that occurred reflected the revolutionary way Winckelmann’s model of imitation lost its original significance. In both English and German, “imitation” or “die Nachahmung,” took on an increasingly pejorative sense. Although Winckelmann himself had opposed “imitation” and “copy,” by the early nineteenth century the line between the two had become blurred. The sense of innovation which lay behind “imitation” as an act of creative production was lost, and it now reflected an inferior reproduction, a plagiarized copy. By 1817, Canova himself denied the similarities between Perseus and the Apollo in a letter to Leopoldo Cicognara. He wrote, “There are an inf inite number of ancient and modern statues that resemble the Apollo much more than my Perseus.”105 Even he became increasingly conscious of the pejorative significance of imitation, for, when discussing his Napoleon as Mars, he reportedly stated that his work would “never be an imitation, nor a copy.”106 The sculptor, therefore, was very attuned to

105 Cited in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 952. 106 Melchior Missirini, Della vita di Antonio Canova: Libri quattro, ed. Francesco Leone (Prato: Frat. Giachetti, 1824; Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2004), 307.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

the negative reactions to his work. His initial enthusiasm for comparative study between Perseus and Apollo faded as criticism of Perseus increased, and Canova distanced himself further and further from the ancient masterpieces that had once been his models. Even after his death Canova’s biographers felt the need to stand up to critics who implied he lacked originality.107 Melchior Missirini, for instance, defended the artist against those who accused him of “plagiarizing.”108 Cicognara tried to reintroduce the original meaning of “imitation” in his writing, arguing that those individuals who could f ind no faults with the execution of Perseus inevitably chose to critique the concept of the work instead.109 If the work did recall the Apollo, he argued, it was not due to any “poverty of genius” but rather to the fact that the human body naturally adopted certain postures that varied little from one to the other.110 Cicognara relied on Canova’s own vocabulary to defend the artist, citing, almost word for word, the very letter the sculptor had written him in 1817.111 Despite, however, his defenders’ best efforts to argue that he would “emerge truly original,” the critiques against Canova as imitator, copier, and plagiarist remained inviolable.112 107 See Memes, Memoirs of Antonio Canova, 387–389 and 388, footnote 1. 108 Missirini, Della vita di Antonio Canova, 305. There were several writers who used the word “plagiarism” when describing Canova’s works. For two examples, see T. Medwin, “Canova. Leaves from the Autobiography of an Amateur,” Fraser’s Magazine for Town and Country XX.CXVII (September 1839): 374; and James Wilson, A Journal of Two Successive Tours upon the Continent, in the Years 1816, 1817, & 1818, 3 vols. (London: T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1820), vol. 2, 114. 109 Cicognara, Storia della scultura, vol. 7, 151–152. 110 Ibid., vol. 7, 153. 111 Ibid., vol. 7, 152–153. 112 Leopoldo Cicognara, Biografia di Antonio Canova (Venice: Giambattista Missiaglia, 1823), 52–53.

3. Anatomizing the Female Nude Abstract: Chapter three, “Anatomizing the Female Nude,” focuses on Canova’s 1812 Venus Italica, which was celebrated as the replacement for the Venus de’Medici after the latter was sent to Paris. After the Venus de’Medici returned to Florence, however, Canova’s Venus Italica was moved from the Tribuna in the Uffizi to the Palazzo Pitti. There, displayed in a “boudoir” surrounded by mirrors, visitors focused on the softness (“morbidezza”) of her flesh. Canova’s viewers mitigated the discourse of seduction and desire generated by soft flesh, transforming their interest into anatomical inquiry. The predilection for “scientific” examination not only reflected the period’s conservative social mores but also reveals how sculpture was implicated in the construction of racial and gender hierarchies. Keywords: gender, polychromy, race and skin tone, flesh, morbidezza, Venus Italica

The criticism leveled against Canova’s Perseus—that it failed to live up to its antique model—was aimed equally at other works by the artist. His Venus Italica, for instance, was understood as a replacement for the Venus de’Medici, which, like so many other antiquities, had also entered the Louvre’s collections. Installed in 1812 as Canova approached the height of his fame, the Venus Italica raised similar concerns about cultural patrimony, the role of imitation in the production of the fine arts, and the relationship between ancient and modern sculpture. Yet the Venus Italica, like so many of Canova’s female nudes, was also deemed beautiful and graceful; Canova excelled in the genre. The supple surface of the Venus Italica therefore enabled viewers to grapple with the legacy of Baroque “softness,” sculpture’s desirability, and changing attitudes towards the female body and its anatomy.

The Creation of a Modern Venus Canova’s Venus Italica cannot be understood outside of the context of Florence’s artistic history (Fig. 3.1). While the city lacked the sublime beauty of Naples and the classical culture of Rome, it was the birthplace of Renaissance culture. The city boasted the oldest academy on the Italian peninsula, the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, as well as what was arguably one of the first “public” exhibition spaces, the Tribuna of the Uffizi.1 Completed in 1589 and designed to showcase the collection of the Grand Duke, Francesco I de’Medici, by the eighteenth century it was considered a mandatory stop on the Grand Tour. 1 See Paula Findlen, “Uff izi Gallery, Florence: The Rebirth of a Museum in the Eighteenth Century,” in The First Modern Museums of Art: The Birth of an Institution in 18th- and Early-19th-Century Europe, ed. Carole Paul (Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012), 72–111.

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_ch03

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Fig. 3.1: Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812. Marble, 172 × 55 × 52 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. White Images / Scala / Art Resource, NY

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Fig. 3.2: Fratelli Alinari, Photograph of the Venus de’Medici (first century BCE), ca. 1856–1872. Albumen silver print, 33 × 25.2 cm (Sculpture: Marble, h. 153 cm). J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

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The collection housed several famous antiquities and the Venus de’Medici (first century BCE) was one of the most treasured2 (Fig. 3.2). Although much desired by the French as they began their conquest of Italy at the end of the eighteenth century, the Venus de’Medici and other works in the Uff izi were initially protected from French rapacity. With the death of Gian Gastone de’Medici in 1737 and the end of the Medici dynasty, Tuscany became part of the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty and fell under Austrian rule. The savvy Anna Maria Luisa, Gian Gastone’s sister, drew up a special codicil in the 1737 Family Pact with the new grand duke, Francis Stephen (r. 1737–1765); the works in the Uff izi were designated the property of the Florentine people, rather than the private property of the Grand Duke and his successors.3 When the Directory declared war on Austria on March 12, 1799, and forced Grand Duke Ferdinand III (r. 1790–1801, 1814–1824) into exile, works in the Uffizi were therefore left untouched.4 The collection of the Palazzo Pitti, on the other hand, was considered the private collection of the Grand Duke and many of its works were transported to Paris in June 1799.5 Despite assurances from the French that the works in the Uffizi would not be touched, Grand Duke Ferdinand III ordered Tommaso Puccini, then director of the Uff izi Gallery, to protect the most important pieces should conditions in Tuscany change.6 At Puccini’s 2 For the history of the Venus de’Medici, see Francis Haskell and Nicholas Penny, Taste and the Antique: The Lure of Classical Sculpture, 1500–1900 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998), 325–328. 3 Findlen, “Uffizi Gallery, Florence,” 80–81. 4 Ibid., 105–106. 5 Gabriele Paolini, Simulacri spiranti, imagin vive: Il recupero delle opere d’arte Toscane nel 1815 (Florence: Edizioni Polistampa, 2006), 16. 6 Chiara Pasquinelli, La galleria in esilio: Il trasferimento delle opere d’arte da Firenze a Palermo a cura del

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behest, f ifty-f ive cases were transported to Palermo, where they arrived on October 5, 1800. Ferdinand III’s foresight was rewarded in 1801, when Austria was forced to sign a peace treaty with France, the Treaty of Aranjuez, and he formally renounced his reign of Tuscany on March 20, 1801. The region was given to Ludovico (Luigi) I di Bourbon-Parma (1773–1803), the son of the Duke of Parma and son-in-law of the King of Spain. He arrived in Florence in August of that same year with the title the King of Etruria. After Ludovico I ascended the throne, he ordered Puccini to return the works of art from Palermo to the Uff izi. While the bulk of the collection was restored without issue, Napoleon had found an excuse to obtain the Venus de’Medici for the Musée Napoléon. She was to be a diplomatic gift for his role in brokering the Treaty of Aranjuez. Although shipment was delayed for as long as possible, the request was impossible to refuse, and the Venus de’Medici was eventually shipped to France in 1802. She arrived in Paris at the Quai du Louvre on July 14, 1803, and was installed by Vivant Denon for Napoleon’s birthday celebrations and the opening of the Musée Napoléon on August 15.7 As with the Apollo Belvedere and the Laocoön, her arrival was celebrated with coins minted in her honor, bearing the inscription “Aux arts la victoire” (“To Art, Victory”), reaffirming Napoleon’s cultural triumph. In Florence, however, her absence was felt deeply. In 1802–1803, when visitors attended the Uffizi during the Peace of Amiens, they noted the “vacant frames and unoccupied pedestals” which emphasized the cabinets’ “past rather than their present glory.”8 Cavalier Tommaso Puccini (1800–1803) (Pisa: ETS, 2008). 7 Francis Henry Taylor, The Taste of Angels: A History of Art Collecting from Rameses to Napoleon (Boston: Little Brown, 1948), 555. 8 John Chetwode Eustace, A Classical Tour through Italy, An. MDCCCII, 6th ed., 4 vols. (London: J. Mawman,

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Canova’s sculpture began out of this place of loss. It was also the closest he ever came to making a copy of an ancient sculpture. Giovanni degli Alessandri, president of the Accademia di Belle Arti and after Puccini’s death in 1811, director of the Galleria degli Uffizi, requested a work to take the place of the Venus de’Medici from Canova in 1802. The details of the commission have been laid out by Hugh Honour.9 Canova requested a plaster cast of the Venus de’Medici in 1803 from Alessandri and began pointing it for transfer to marble shortly after that. At the same time, however, he began modeling another standing Venus. The first Venus he completed was sent to Munich; the second would become the Venus Italica. Although the Venus Italica was not begun to take the place of the Venus de’Medici—and only did so when the copy was abandoned—by the time of its installation in 1812, Alessandri referred to it as a “replacement” for the ancient work.10 The status of Canova’s Venus was reinforced by the latter’s placement on the Venus de’Medici’s pedestal in the Tribuna. As with Perseus, it was an honor that Canova’s modern work was deemed worthy to be placed on the empty pedestal of one of the most admired works of antiquity. But shortly after her installation, Canova visited Florence and insisted that his Venus Italica be placed on a different base.11 A new pedestal was provided for Canova’s work. Its form was in keeping with the sculptor’s interest in display, for it was furnished with a turntable.12 1821), vol. 3, 357. 9 Hugh Honour, “Canova’s Statues of Venus,” The Burlington Magazine 114.835 (Oct. 1972): 658–671. Republished and amplified in Hugh Honour, “Canova e la storia di due Venere,” in Gabriella Capecchi et al., Palazzo Pitti: La reggia rilevata (Florence: Giunti, 2003), 192–209. 10 Cited in Honour, “Canova’s Statues of Venus,” 665. 11 Ibid., 666, note 48. 12 Ibid.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

The empty pedestal of the Venus de’Medici, was, however, kept nearby in a poignant reminder of her absence. Canova himself seemed quite happy with this installation, although with his usual diffidence he claimed that he had not expected such an enthusiastic response from the public. The comparison between his work and that of classical antiquity made him “tremble.”13 Yet, Canova’s willingness to relinquish the Venus de’Medici’s pedestal was strategic. Not only did he garner even more praise for his “modesty” after refusing to place his statue on the Venus de’Medici’s base, but the presence of the empty pedestal also functioned similarly to the cast of the Apollo Belvedere in the Museo Pio-Clementino. That is, it signaled the presence of the Venus de’Medici by making her absence palpable, and in so doing, ensured that Canova’s work would be continually compared to the ancient sculpture.14 As with the Perseus, Canova’s Venus was repeatedly referred to as a “consolation.”15 It was inevitable, then, that the arrival of the Venus Italica in Florence in 1812 was greeted not only with great eagerness but also prompted a discussion about the region’s artistic preeminence and cultural patrimony. This had, as we have seen, occurred in both Rome and Naples. The Venus Italica symbolized both Florence’s great cultural losses and its prowess in modern art. Yet unlike Venus and Adonis and the Apollo Belvedere, the Venus Italica could not be so easily 13 Cited in Antonio Canova and Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Il Carteggio Canova-Quatremère de Quincy, 1785–1822, ed. Giuseppe Pavanello and Fran­ cesco Paolo Luiso Ponzano (Ponzano, Italy: Vianello, 2005), 153. 14 For Canova’s “modesty,” see Honour, “Canova’s Statues of Venus,” 666, note 48. 15 Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages; ou, mémoires historiques sur la vie et les travaux de célèbre artiste (Paris: A. Le Clere, 1834), 139.

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appropriated for proto-nationalist purposes. Although the Florentine’s privations were to be blamed on the French, in the end, it was Napoleon himself who paid for Canova’s sculpture. Elisa Bonaparte Bacciochi, Napoleon’s sister and the Grand Duchess of Tuscany, had arrived on the throne in 1809 after the Venus Italica had been commissioned. She understandably balked at paying for a purchase that had been undertaken by her predecessor.16 She asked Napoleon to purchase the work for the city, to which he agreed, and the work was installed under her auspices. The tension between Canova’s status as an “Italian” artist, Napoleon’s support of the sculptor, and the French avidity for Italian works of art underlay the reception of the statue in the first years after its installation. Moreover, the status of Canova’s Venus was further complicated by the fact that she too was in danger of being transported to France. One of the conditions of the purchase of the work appears to have been that after the Venus’ initial display in Florence, it was to go to Paris for the 1812 Salon.17 In a letter dated October 25, 1812, the poet Ippolito Pindemonte lamented to Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, Canova’s friend and biographer, that he had not been aware “of the danger in which Florence is, of losing even the modern Venus.”18 The threat of the work’s departure did not end in 1812. In both 1821 and 1827, the French tried to regain Canova’s Venus for the Musée du Louvre, claiming ownership of the work because of Napoleon’s payment.19 16 Honour, “Canova’s Statues of Venus,” 665. 17 Ibid., 665, note 45. 18 Ippolito Pindemonte, Lettere a Isabella (1784–1828), ed. Gilberto Pizzamiglio (Florence: L. S. Olschki, 2000), 204, letter 69. 19 Ferdinand Boyer, “Nouveaux documents sur Canova et Napoléon,” in A travers l’art Italien du XVe au XXe siécle; Essais, notes et commentaires, ed. Henri Bédarida (Paris: Boivin, 1949), 200, note 2, and 201.

For the four years that the Venus Italica stood in the Tribuna, then, her identity vacillated, alternately signifying the Venus de’Medici’s loss, France’s intervention in the politics and cultural identity of Florence, the avowal of Canova’s genius, and a proto-nationalist declaration of Italy’s artistic prowess.

Venus in the Boudoir After Napoleon’s deposition in 1815, the status of the Venus Italica changed. Tuscany was the first Italian state to regain its works of art. Canova had a direct role in their restitution and was said to have wept with joy as the Venus de’Medici was removed from the Louvre in 1815.20 The Florentines celebrated the return of their works of art with a special eight-day exhibition held in the Accademia di Belle Arti.21 The press delighted in the works’ return and the “renowned” Venus de’Medici was, of course, singled out.22 At the close of the Accademia exhibition, the Venus de’Medici was returned to the Tribuna, reinstalled against crimson drapery that offset her creamy marble (Fig. 3.3). Her reinstallation naturally led to material changes in the exhibition conditions of the Venus Italica. At the personal request of the restored Grand Duke, Ferdinand III, the Venus Italica was moved from the Uff izi to the private ducal apartments in the Palazzo Pitti. Although this transition was portrayed as an honor for the sculptor, it presented a personal crisis for Canova. Lengthy correspondence in 1816 and 1817 between Canova and Giovanni degli Alessandri reveals how fervently Canova tried to

20 Andrew Robertson on Oct. 4, 1815, cited in Taylor, The Taste of Angels, 586. 21 Paolini, Simulacri spiranti, 166. 22 La Gazzetta di Firenze (4 Jan. 1816), cited in ibid., 163.

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Fig. 3.3: The Venus de’Medici in the Tribuna in the Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, ca. 1870–1890. Albumen print, 19.5 × 25.3 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

dissuade Alessandri from moving his Venus.23 Canova dreaded the Venus Italica’s repositioning in the Palazzo Pitti, where he lamented it would be “buried.”24 Canova suggested that his sculpture “at least be exhibited [in the Uffizi] in the rooms with the Venetian School, both 23 This correspondence was recently included in Honour, “Canova e la storia di due Venere,” 204–207. For the full text of the letters, see Antonio Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), ed. Hugh Honour and Paolo Mariuz, 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno, 2002). 24 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 1, 113–114.

because I belong to the nation, and also because I believe it has good light, and certainly then it would be equally in sight of all those who visit the Gallery.”25 His laments were to no avail. Alessandri insisted there was no room for the sculpture in the Tribuna and moreover it was the Duke’s “special predilection” for the Venus Italica that inspired her move to his apartments—a point that Alessandri emphasized not one, but twice,

25 Ibid., vol. 1, 113.

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in his correspondence with Canova. 26 The Duke was insistent, and the correspondence reveals the tension between Canova’s desires and those of his royal patron. Canova’s friends tried their best to assuage him. On March 28, 1816, Ottavia Odescalchi Rospigliosi, Canova’s friend and wife of Giuseppe Rospigliosi, the Duke’s treasurer, wrote to Canova about the Duke’s wishes, insisting that while his private collection was admired even now, in a few years’ time, thanks to the Venus, it would be the most beautiful royal collection that exists.27 Even this, however, did not appease Canova. On November 16, 1816, he wrote to the Grand Duke himself. He begged that his Venus be reinstalled in the Uff izi not only because of the lighting, but also “for the self-love, that an artist has, that his works be seen, at least for the time that he is alive.” Once again Canova suggested the room with Venetian painting as an alternative to the Tribuna, for there, at least, the light and the rotating pedestal would flatter the work and, more importantly, allow it to be “more easily accessible to all foreigners, more easily seen and better known by them for that which she is.”28 Canova’s letters—to Alessandri, to Ros­ pigliosi, and to the Duke himself—continue until November 6, 1817—a year and half after the initial correspondence, when Canova, finally defeated, asks Alessandri one last time in a postscript, “So there’s no chance my Venus can go in the room with the other Venetians?”29 The latter replied that as much as he would like to claim the sculpture for the Uff izi, he had stopped hoping to receive it, for “the Grand

26 Ibid., vol. 1, 151. 27 Ibid., vol. 1, 268. 28 Ibid., vol. 1, 514. 29 Ibid., vol. 2, 1094.

Duke loves to enjoy that beautiful girl in his cabinet too much.”30 The wealth of correspondence here and Canova’s distress over the placement of the work revealed Canova’s artistic anxiety about lighting, display, meaningful juxtapositions, and association with past masters in the distinctly modern context of the museum. He understood that the Uffizi would provide a larger audience for his work, that the juxtaposition with the Venus de’Medici could only improve the status of his sculpture, and that lighting and direct engagement with the object were key to its success. His own artistic concerns, however, were in direct conflict with those of his royal patron, and while the latter entertained Canova’s opinions and seemed to seriously consider them, in the end the Grand Duke’s personal desire for the statue and the promotion of his own royal collection prevailed. The sculpture remained in the Palazzo Pitti, where it still is today. Yet even after Canova’s Venus had been removed from the Tribuna, comparisons between the two sculptures of Venus continued. They were bound together by curious historical circumstances, subject, and form. Like the Venus de’Medici, Canova’s Venus also stands in contrapposto, but her weight rests on her right leg, rather than her left. She steps forward even as she turns to look back over her left shoulder. Swathes of drapery are folded over her right arm, which wraps around her waist; her left hand holds the upper edge of the fabric up towards her breast. Despite this gesture, both her breasts are exposed, and her thumb presses the cloth to her chest, but the rest of her fingers rest on bare skin (Fig. 3.4). The fabric follows the length of her right leg, molding to her flesh and revealing the contours of the thigh and knee beneath the cloth. Then the drapery gathers and 30 Ibid., vol. 2, 1119.

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pulls around the back of her body, stretching between her calves, breaking over the perfume box, and puddling under her arched left foot (Fig. 3.5). Despite the differences between the two sculptures, however, the comparisons were detrimental to the Venus Italica’s reputation. Similarities between the works reinforced the idea that Canova lacked originality. At the same time, differences between the works were not interpreted by viewers as an indication of Canova’s conceptual genius; instead, they reaffirmed critiques of her form. Various elements of the composition, for instance—the drapery, her turned head, the perfume box which would have contained scented oils—all contributed to the notion that Canova’s Venus had emerged from the bath. Viewers found her beautiful, but well into midcentury the comparison to the Venus de’Medici and the association with the bath reified her. In her Diary of an Ennuyé, based on her travels to Italy in 1821–1822, Anna Jameson found her to be “a triumph of modern art: but though a most beautiful creature, she is not a goddess.”31 In 1823, an anonymous author in The New Monthly Magazine accused Canova of having adhered “wholly to nature,” thus creating a “mere woman.”32 Her size—for she was larger than the Venus de’Medici—reinforced her earthly status. The English poet John Edmund Reade, who spent part of the 1830s in Italy, found her “[a] finely-developed woman, she is too substantial for the half-aerial nymph: there is nothing of the divinity of Venus in her.”33

Fig. 3.4: Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812 (detail, torso, and side view). Marble, 172 × 55 × 52 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Mondadori Portfolio / Electa / Sergio Anelli / Bridgeman Images

31 Anna Jameson, The Diary of an Ennuyée (Boston: Lilly, Wait, Colman, and Holden, 1833), 125. 32 “Modern Pilgrimages. No. VIII. The Studio of Canova,” The New Monthly Magazine and Literary Journal VII (1823): 30. 33 John Edmund Reade, Prose from the South, Comprising Personal Observations during a Tour through Switzerland, Italy and Naples, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (London: Charles Ollier, 1849) vol. 2, 30.

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Moreover, her gestures—the turned head and clutched drapery—suggest that she was startled by the sudden appearance of a visitor. Her greatest crime was her awareness of her nudity. The judge Henry Matthews, who traveled throughout Italy from 1817 to 1819, noted “the manner in which she compresses that scanty drapery which the sculptor has given her, [was] intended, I suppose, “‘to double every charm it seeks to hide.’”34 The American lawyer George Stillman Hillard was more critical. The Venus, he remarked, “is huddling her drapery about her, and, at the same time, an expression in her face seems to says [sic], ‘Am I not doing it becomingly?’ reminding one of a veteran belle who covers her face with her fan to hide the blush that should be there, and at the same time looks through the sticks to observe the effect.”35 This false modesty was exacerbated by the sculpture’s change in location. Although the Venus Italica is now installed in the so-called Sala di Venere in the Palazzo Pitti, in the early nineteenth century it was placed at the very end of the suite of private apartments, in the Gabinetto Rotondo (Fig. 3.6). Created as part of a series of rooms for the Grand Duchess, the room was completed in 1765–1766 and slightly modif ied by Elisa Bonaparte Bacciochi in 1811.36 Much of the decoration remained the same under Ferdinand III, with the notable exception that Canova’s Venus was placed in

34 Henry Matthews, The Diary of an Invalid, Being the Journal of a Tour in Pursuit of Health, in Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, and France, in the Years 1817, 1818, and 1819, 2nd ed. (London: John Murray, 1820), 46. 35 George Stillman Hillard, Six Months in Italy, 3rd ed., 2 vols. (Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1854), vol. 1, 155. 36 Marco Chiarini and Serena Padovani, eds., Gli appartamenti reali di Palazzo Pitti. Una reggia per tre dinastie: Medici, Lorena, e Savoia tra Granducato e Regno d’Italia (Florence: Centro Di, 1993), 277–283.

Fig. 3.5: Antonio Canova, Venus Italica, 1804–1812 (rear view). Marble, 172 × 52 × 55 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Luisa Ricciarini / Bridgeman Images

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Fig. 3.6: The Gabinetto Rotondo in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY

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the center of the room.37 The room also had four mirrors inset in the walls, which allowed viewers to see multiple angles of the sculpture from one vantage point, thus increasing their visual delectation. Joseph Romain Colomb, who traveled to Florence in 1812, commented on the way the “charming statue was repeated infinite times in the four mirrors,” and a year later a French travel guide similarly described the way the Venus Italica, “placed on a pedestal in the middle of the cabinet, was repeated in the mirror in different points of view, in such a way that one could from the same spot contemplate all the forms and the attitude of the enchantress.”38 The mirrors and the Venus Italica’s selfawareness thus reinforced her characterization as a modern, worldly woman. Moreover the space was understood by many viewers as a “boudoir”—a highly charged, sexualized, feminine space that had been invented in the eighteenth century.39 First described as a room where a woman could go “pout,” the boudoir was quickly associated with privacy, the intimacy of the toilette, and (illicit) sexual encounters. 40 Although the “boudoir” was primarily a French space, and the “toilette” largely a French ritual—neither Britain nor Italy had a precise counterpart for either—the feminine nature of 37 Enrico Colle, “Il secondo periodo Lorenese (1814–1860): I granduchi Ferdinando III e Leopoldo II,” in ibid., 108. 38 M. R. C. [Stendhal], Journal d’un voyage en Italie et en Suisse en 1828 (Paris: Verdière, 1833), 40, and Nouveau guide du voyageur en Italie, 8 vols. (Milan: François Sonzogno, 1829), vol. 2, 388–389, respectively. 39 The room was identif ied as a “boudoir” by many travelers. See Matthews, The Diary of an Invalid, 33, and Harriet Morton, Protestant Vigils, or, Evening Records of a Journey in Italy in the Years 1826 and 1827, 2 vols. (London: R. B. Seeley and W. Burnside, 1829), vol. 1, 31. 40 Annik Pardailhé-Galabrun, The Birth of Intimacy: Privacy and Domestic Life in Early Modern Paris, trans. Jocelyn Phelps (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991), 63–64.

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both the boudoir and toilette was understood by all European viewers. Indeed, across Europe, sexual intimacy was closely associated with feminine interiors in both literature and art; parallels were made between rooms designated specifically for women and the interior spaces in women’s bodies, “eroticizing the relationship between women, the interior, and privacy.”41 Changing attitudes towards both the toilette and the space of the boudoir in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries help us understand the strong reaction to Canova’s sculpture. The toilette was often composed of two parts. Both were “public,” although admittance to the first was reserved for a woman’s closest attendants and was largely devoted to putting on makeup and primping. 42 As the eighteenth century progressed, however, this first toilette became more intimate and more closely associated with the ritual of bathing. Washing oneself was always viewed with some degree of suspicion; hot water and the intimate touch required might lead to the “awakening of sexual desire” and thus to salacious activities.43 By the early nineteenth century changing social mores rendered the public nature of the toilette obsolete. In her 1818 Dictionnaire critique et raisonné des etiquettes, Madame de Genlis commented that “that there were sometimes 41 Karen Harvey, “Eroticizing the Interior,” in Imagined Interiors: Representing the Domestic Interior since the Renaissance, ed. Jeremy Aynsley and Charlotte Grant with assistance from Harriet McKay (London: V&A Publications, 2006), 132–133. 42 Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell, “Dressing to Impress: The Morning Toilette and the Fabrication of Femininity,” in Paris: Life and Luxury in the Eighteenth Century, ed. Charisa Bremer-David (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2011), 55. 43 See Georges Vigarello, Concepts of Cleanliness: Changing Attitudes in France since the Middle Ages, trans. Jean Birrell (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 173–176.

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Fig. 3.7: François Boucher, The Toilette of Venus, 1751. Oil on canvas, 108.3 × 85.1 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Bequest of William K. Vanderbilt, 1920

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Fig. 3.8: Louis-Marin Bonnet after Nicolas-René Jollain, La Toilette, 1781. Color stipple. Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

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Fig. 3.9: Anonymous, La Toilette Intime, ca. 1765. Colored aquatint, 17.1 × 12.8 cm. Musée Carnavalet, Paris, France. Paris Musées / Musée Carnavalet – Histoire de Paris

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things in very bad taste that would seem utterly ridiculous nowadays. For example, the almost general habit women had of dressing in front of men, and that of being painted at one’s toilette.”44 The ritual was no longer one which to participants were invited. Even depictions of the toilette, which had once been the subject of large allegorical paintings, such as Boucher’s Venus at Her Toilette, gradually were replaced by scenes which were more domestic, both in subject matter and in scale45 (Fig. 3.7). Representations of women at their toilette—getting in and out of the bath, drying off, or admiring themselves in mirrors—became increasingly intimate, sexualized, and lewd. Concomitantly they were less frequently rendered in paint and distributed instead as smaller, less expensive prints. In these images, such as Nicolas-René Jollain’s 1780 After the Bath, a painting that was reproduced as a colored print, or La Toilette Intime, from the late eighteenth century, naked women admire their own bodies, gaze at their reflections in carefully positioned mirrors, and touch themselves (Figs. 3.8–3.9). Often, their awareness of—and delectation in—their own corporeal presence was reinforced by a gawking male who intruded on the scene, much to his delight. As women increasingly isolated themselves during their baths, representations of women at their toilette or bathing continued to decline from 1800 to 1850. By mid-century representations of women at the bath often depicted working-class

44 As cited in Nadeije Laneyrie-Dagen and Georges Vigarello, “Premier XIXe siècle: L’exigence d’isolement = The Early Nineteenth Century: The Insistence on Isolation,” in La toilette: Naissance de l’intime = La Toilette: The Invention of Privacy (Paris: Musée Marmottan and Éditions Hazan, 2015), 123. 45 See Nadeije Laneyrie-Dagen and Georges Vigarello, “La culture des lumières: Ablutions partielles et nudités libertines = Enlightenment Culture: Partial Ablutions and Libertine Nakedness,” in ibid., 79–119.

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women or sex workers. 46 Edgar Degas’ pastels of bathing women in the 1870s were the most forceful example of this link. 47 The image of a woman drying herself off therefore quickly became indecent. The Gabinetto Rotondo and its décor only exacerbated this vulgarity. What should have been a private, feminine space had been transformed into a very public one—an art museum—and the Venus Italica’s private ablutions were put on public display. The scandalous nature of this private-turned-public gesture was intensified by Article 330 of 1810 Napoleonic Penal Code, to which Florence was also subject while under French dominion. Article 330 punished any “public outrage against modesty” with both imprisonment and a fine and has been credited with “invention of public modesty.”48 As Marcela Iacub points out, Article 330 also transformed the understanding of space; “public indecency rendered sexuality into a spatial event the legitimacy of which depended on its visibility or invisibility to the public. Sexual behavior was thus conceived as a spectacle, and was deemed legal or illegal, depending on what the perpetrators, these ‘actors despite themselves,’ chose as their stage.”49 The comparisons between Canova’s Venus and Parisian opera dancers that crop up in travel diaries in the mid-nineteenth century clearly reaffirm the link between bathing, lower-class women, and sexual promiscuity. Marguerite Gardiner, 46 See Laneyrie-Dagen and Vigarello, “Premier XIXe siècle: L’exigence d’isolement,” 124–125. 47 For Degas’ bathers, see Anthea Callen, “Degas’ Bathers: Hygiene and Dirt—Gaze and Touch,” in Dealing with Degas: Representations of Women and the Politics of Vision, ed. Richard Kendall and Griselda Pollock (London: Pandora Press, 1992), 159–185. 48 Marcela Iacub, Through the Keyhole: A History of Sex, Space and Public Modesty in Modern France, trans. Vinay Swamy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2016), 22–25. 49 Ibid., 18.

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the Countess of Blessington and Irish novelist, dismissed Canova’s Venus as “inferior” to the Venus de’Medici. “There is something affected and meretricious, too,” she wrote, “in the air and attitude of his female statues, which conveys the notion that his models have been taken from the Opera House, ere they had lost their roundness of contour by excess of dancing. They look languishing and coquettish; and seem conscious of their nudity and their charms, rather than really modest.”50 She continued, “it is only to be regretted that he did not select models more free from affectation, and with less of the air petite maîtresse.”51 The French librarian Antoine Claude Pasquin, writing under the pseudonym M. Valery, saw the sculpture in situ in 1826–1828. In his often-reprinted Historical, Literary, and Artistic Travels in Italy, first published in 1832, he too argued: Canova’s Venus, despite its renown, the honours it received, the enthusiasm it excited when brought to Florence to replace the absent Venus of Medici, the surname of Italica conferred by the public voice, the numerous copies made by himself and others, the beauty of the marble, the excellence of the naked, struck me as vulgar in expression and mien: larger than the antique statue, it is less ideal and divine. Above all, it has not the same voluptuous bashfulness. One might call it in plain terms, a grisette wiping herself. Perhaps, too, the curtains, the dim light of the cabinet where it is placed, and the glasses which reflect it on all sides, contribute still further to give it that air of a boudoir figure which speaks more to the sense than the soul, and make it appear still more terrestrial and modern.52 50 Countess of Blessington [Marguerite Gardiner], The Idler in Italy, 2 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, 1839), vol. 2, 139. 51 Ibid., vol. 2, 140. 52 M. Valery, Historical, Literary, and Artistic Travels in Italy: A Complete and Methodical Guide for Travellers

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Pasquin identifies Canova’s Venus as a grisette— “a flirtatious and gallant young female worker.”53 Far from idealized, she becomes a classed, working body. Her quotidian gesture, and the contemporary setting, rooted her in the now and made viewers conscious of her bodily presence. It was partially for this reason, then, that although John Bell admired the room’s décor, he himself would have not positioned her in the center of the room, surrounded by mirrors; “I should have done more,” he wrote, “and rendered it an incomparable work of art, by placing the back close to the wall.”54 One might say, then, that the luxurious space of the boudoir in combination with the overtly sexual nature of the sculpture and her intimate, yet common gestures, created “a reality effect” that emphasized the work’s modernity.55 This, in turn, was emphasized by another “reality effect”—Canova’s use of tinted wax to stain the surface of his sculptures.

The Tinted Surface Throughout the eighteenth century a preference for both material unity and whiteness emerged with regards to marble sculpture. For critics, Canova committed a terrible infraction and Artists, trans. C. E. Clifton (Paris: Baudry’s European Library, 1839), 373. 53 For the definition of “grisette,” see the 1835 edition of the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française available at Dictionnaires autrefois, Public Access Collection, University of Chicago, https://artflsrv03.uchicago.edu/ philologic4/publicdicos/query?report=bibliography&h ead=grisette. 54 John Bell, Observations on Italy, ed. R. A. Bell (Edinburgh: William Blackwood and T. Cadell, 1825), 288. 55 See Roland Barthes, “The Reality Effect,” in The Rustle of Language, trans. Richard Howard (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986), 141–148.

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twice over. To begin with, he periodically added materials such as bronze or gilt to his sculptures. The introduction of metal into a marble work, however, was at least partially justified by a nascent understanding of the use of polychromy in antiquity.56 Even the Venus de’Medici once had gold earrings, to which her pierced ears attest, and she bears the traces of a golden band around her upper arm. The same understanding was not extended to the painted surface.57 Despite literary sources such as Pliny’s Natural History and Vitruvius’ De architectura, which suggested sculptures were painted, not to mention growing archaeological evidence, the use of color was still viewed with suspicion. Although Canova did not apply opaque paint to his sculptures, his tendency to wax and tint them was nonetheless suspect. According to one biographer, Henri de Latouche, his “enemies” referred to it as “charlatanism,” yet it was regular practice on Canova’s part until the end of his career.58 The Venus in Venus and Adonis, for instance, completed in 1795, was given a slightly yellow tint, and in 1799 Général Baron Thiébault was surprised that the flesh of “all” of Canova’s sculptures was stained to distinguish it from drapery.59 A few years later Joseph Forsyth 56 Roberta Panzanelli, ed., The Color of Life: Polychromy in Sculpture from Antiquity to the Present (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum and Getty Research Institute, 2008). 57 See, for instance, Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatre­ mère de Quincy, “Sur M. Canova et les quatre ouvrages qu’on voit de lui à l’exposition publique de 1808: par M. Quatremère de Quinci [sic],” Gazette nationale ou le moniteur universel, no. 565 (Dec. 28, 1808): 1429. 58 Henri de Latouche and Etienne Achille Réveil, Œuvre de Canova, recueil de gravures d’après ses statues et ses bas-reliefs (Paris: Audot, 1825), 18. 59 Augustin Creuze de Lesser, Voyage en Italie et en Sicile, fait en MDCCCI et MDCCCII (Paris: P. Didot l’Ainé, 1806), 313–314; and Paul Charles François Adrien Henri

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admired the “waxen gloss” of the boxer Creugas in the Vatican—although Carl Ludwig Fernow found the same effect repellant.60 Louis Simond spoke to Canova about the “peculiar softness of his sculpture” when he visited the artist’s studio in 1817–1818; not only did he comment on the distinction between the “ochre” of the flesh and the “whiteness” of the drapery, he also noted that the “hair is a shade a little darker than the flesh.”61 In addition to yellowing the flesh of his figures, Canova sometimes tinted the cheeks and lips of his female sculptures with rouge. This was the case with all four versions of his Hebe as well as the first version of the Penitent Magdalene.62 Conservators suggest that the Three Graces in the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Ideal Head in the Ashmolean may also have been treated this way.63 Although it is unclear to what extent Canova tinted the flesh of his Venus Italica, given that this was regular practice for the artist, we can assume that she too was at least lightly polished to differentiate flesh from drapery. These treatments caused viewers’ consternation. Augustin Creuze de Lesser, who saw one version of Hebe in Canova’s studio in 1802, Dieudonne Thiébault, Mémoires du General Bon Thiébault, publiés sous les auspices de sa fille Claire Thiébault, d’après le manuscrit original, par Fernand Calmettes, 7th ed., 5 vols. (Paris: E. Plon, Nourrit, 1893–1895), vol. 2, 549, respectively. 60 Joseph Forsyth, Remarks on Antiquities, Arts, and Letters during an Excursion in Italy, in the Years 1802 and 1803, ed. Keith Crook (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2001), 113, and Carl Ludwig Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova und dessen Werke,” Römische Studien, 3 vols. (Zürich: H. Gessner, 1806), vol. 1, 147, respectively. 61 Louis Simond, Voyage en Italie et en Sicile, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Paris: A. Sautelet, 1828), vol. 1, 272. 62 See Mark Norman and Richard Cook, “‘Just a Tiny Bit of Rouge upon the Lips and Cheeks’: Canova, Colour, and the Classical Ideal,” in Canova: Ideal Heads, ed. Katharine Eustace (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 1997), 51–52. 63 Ibid., 54–56.

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argued that “from the moment one admitted two colors into sculpture, one must admit them all.”64 For other writers, the yellowed skin and pink cheeks and lips were no more than “trickery and quackery.”65 More worrisome was the way these techniques threatened the status of sculpture itself, a concern repeatedly expressed by critics. Such “artifice” was “not worthy of sculpture’s gravitas.”66 Critics complained the use of color was Canova’s misguided attempt “to impart to his statues an air of reality and of heightening their resemblance to nature by artif icial means unconnected with the province of sculpture.”67 Polychromy seemed “calculated for the eye of the amateurs, who are more attracted and flattered, the more soft and mellow the material, the more fused and faded, or, if one may say so, the more formless the form appears.”68 Canova’s influence was also to fear: other sculptors might imitate Canova’s technique, and in so doing destroy “the noble simplicity, the frankness of composition, and even the very style which form the principal character of great works of sculpture.”69 The criticisms leveled at Canova for the addition of materials other than marble to his sculptures and for their tinted surfaces echoed the writings of philosophers and theorists across the continent that had been expressed decades earlier. In his Discourses, for instance, 64 Creuze de Lesser, Voyage en Italie, 313. 65 Matthews, The Diary of an Invalid, 89. 66 M. B., “Beaux-Arts. Salon de 1808. N. XVIII. Sculpture. M. Canova,” Journal de l’Empire (4 Janvier 1809): 3–4. 67 “Memoir of Antonio Canova [with a Portrait],” The New Monthly Magazine and Universal Register 13 (Jan. 1, 1820): 71. The anonymous writer of The New Monthly Magazine cited these criticisms, but ultimately defended Canova’s work. 68 Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova,” 92. 69 Victorin Fabre, “Salon de peinture. Huitième article. Sculptures,” Mercure de France, journal historique, politique et littéraire (24 Decembre 1808): 604.

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Joshua Reynolds argued that the admiration of sculpture was rooted in “intellectual pleasure” and the “contemplation of perfect beauty”—the addition of color transformed the art into “mere entertainment to the senses.”70 In 1778, Johann Gottfried Herder claimed that color rendered sculpture “ugly” because sculpture’s essence was rooted in form and meant to be experienced through touch.71 The Italian theorist Francesco Milizia argued that polychromy was only for “artisans and for the most artless commoners. The artist should not push the illusion to the point where his art is taken for nature itself.”72 And, of course, in his 1764 History of the Art of Antiquity, Winckelmann himself wrote that “color contributes to beauty but is not beauty itself. […] [A] beautiful body will be all the more beautiful the whiter it is.”73 Common to all these criticisms, be they written by philosophers, theorists, or art critics, was the fear that coloring the marble surface breached the very province of the medium; it lessened not just the individual work, but the austerity and seriousness of the art as a whole. Color threatened to make the art of sculpture appealing to a new class of viewers—to “amateurs” who might be pleased, or worse, “entertained”—by the medium. By the early 70 Joshua Reynolds, Discourses on Art, ed. Robert R. Wark (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997), 176–177. 71 Johann Gottfried Herder, Sculpture: Some Observations on Shape and Form from Pygmalion’s Creative Dream, ed. and trans. Jason Gaiger (Riga: Johann Friedrich Hartknoch, 1778; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), 54. 72 See the entry for “Scultura” in Francesco Milizia, Dizionario delle belle arti del disegno estratto in gran parte dalla Enciclopedia Metodica da Francesco Milizia, 2 vols. (Bassano, 1797), vol. 2, 245. 73 Johann Joachim Winckelmann, History of the Art of Antiquity, ed. Alex Potts, trans. Harry Francis (Dresden: 1764; Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2006), 195.

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nineteenth century, as the streets of European cities were overrun with spectacles and new forms of popular amusements, there was real danger that sculpture might become just one more entertainment among many. Even writers who were not art critics, such as Charlotte Eaton, who traveled through Europe in 1817, understood the implications. She objected to the practice of staining marble in a misguided attempt to achieve life. “If,” she wrote, “this [painting of statues] was done, however, in the vain attempt to create a nearer approach to living nature, the objects of sculpture seem to have been strangely mistaken and debased. Most certainly they do not consist in the close imitation of life; for, in that case, a common raree-show of wax-work, would exceed the finest sculpture of Phidias.”74 Winckelmann and eighteenth-century theorists’ celebration of the “whiteness” of Greco-Roman sculpture was therefore embraced by many neoclassical sculptors. Yet Eaton’s statement about the “close imitation of life,” reveals that more is at stake in the issue of the colored surface than either aesthetics or mere “entertainment.” The “living nature” she imagines, whether white marble or peachy wax, presupposes a “white” (i.e. European/Caucasian) individual. Her comment reminds us that debates about the use of color in sculpture at the end of the eighteenth and into the nineteenth century were widely implicated in the newly developing field of “racial science.”75 Sculpture in all media, but particularly marble, helped to construct and celebrate whiteness as both 74 Charlotte A. Eaton, Rome, in the Nineteenth Century; Containing a Complete Account of the Ruins of the Ancient City, the Remains of the Middle Ages, and the Monuments of Modern Times, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, 1820), vol. 3, 297. 75 Anne Lafont, “How Skin Color Became a Racial Marker: Art Historical Perspectives on Race,” EighteenthCentury Studies 51.1 (2017): 89–113.

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normative and ideal. This helped classify people in numerous ways, distinguishing Europeans from foreign (colonial) “others” while also establishing modern ideals of femininity. Color had not just aesthetic import, but moral, political, fiscal, and imperial implications.76 Yet throughout the eighteenth century, the dialectical opposition between “white” skin and “black” skin was not fully established, nor was the hierarchization of “white over black”; this power dynamic was constructed slowly over the century.77 In her study on the history of complexion, for instance, Roxann Wheeler has shown that skin color was only one small part in the eighteenth-century debates on racial composition, which could be shaped by and signify “climate, humors, anatomy, Christianity, and neutral codes.”78 Moreover, color was potentially unstable and deceptive. Anne Lafont’s recent studies on albinism and the “white negro,” for instance, point out that skin color threatened to collapse difference. Eighteenth-century philo­ sophes and anatomists were grappling with the question of “how to resolve the categorization of human beings by the criterion of skin color, if the race farthest from white Europeans, the black race, could very occasionally but nonetheless undeniably become white?”79 It was not until the 1770s that skin color became the primary 76 There is a large body of literature on this topic. For just one example, see Andrew S. Curran, Anatomy of Blackness: Science & Slavery in an Age of Enlightenment (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011). 77 See Curran, Anatomy of Blackness, and Winthrop D. Jordan, White over Black: American Attitudes toward the Negro, 1550–1812, 2nd ed. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012). 78 Roxann Wheeler, The Complexion of Race: Categories of Difference in Eighteenth-Century British Culture (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000), 2. 79 Lafont, “How Skin Color Became a Racial Marker,” 104; see also Anne Lafont, L’Art et la race: L’africain (tout) contre l’œil des Lumières (Dijon: Les presses du réel, 2019).

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way of distinguishing race, a standard which Mechthild Fend, in her recent study on skin and flesh in French art of the period, has argued was established and reinforced by early-nineteenthcentury anatomical studies which rendered skin color an “essentialist” category.80 The increased emphasis on the legibility of skin color as a sign for racial difference went hand in hand with the rising numbers of Black people in Europe (some enslaved, some not). Although estimates vary, by the 1770s, there were about 20,000 Black people in England, many of whom were in London, and 4,000–5,000 in France (a number that is revised up to 8,000 in 1782).81 (On the Italian peninsula, the numbers were much smaller, and the Black population was concentrated in southern Italy and port cities such as Venice and Genova.82) Yet even if the relative numbers to overall population were small, physical and “symbolic presence” of 80 See Wheeler, The Complexion of Race, 9 and 26; and Mechthild Fend, Fleshing out Surfaces: Skin in French Art and Medicine, 1650–1850 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2017), 160. 81 For estimates of the numbers of Blacks in England, see Paul Edwards and James Walvin, Black Personalities in the Era of the Slave Trade (London: Macmillan Press, 1982), 18–19. Norma Myers suggests that in the mid-1780s there were between 1,200 and 7,500 Black individuals in London. See Norma Myers, Reconstructing the Black Past: Blacks in Britain c. 1780–1830 (London: Frank Cass, 1996), 25. For estimates in France, see Pierre H. Boulle, “Black Families in France (Eighteenth–Nineteenth Centuries): Some Cases,” in The Black Populations of France: Histories from Metropole to Colony, ed. Tyler Stovall, Emmanuelle Sibeud, and Sylvain Pattieu (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2022), 69–70 and 84, note 4. 82 For a study of slavery in nineteenth-century Italy which examined the wide range of ethnicities encompassed by the term “Black,” see Giulia Bonazza, Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian States, 1750–1850 (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), esp. 145–146.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Blacks in both England and France provoked an “ideological crisis.”83 France and England both had an expansive colonial presence; “non-white” skin became both a mark of the potential “other” and a body that was, or had the potential to be, enslaved. As views towards slavery and the legal status of slaves shifted, so too did definitions of citizenship, which, in turn, often relied on skin color. By the early nineteenth century in France, for instance, (white) skin color came to define “Frenchness” and provided a readily perceptible way of distinguishing citizens from non-citizens, and free individuals from the enslaved.84 This, in turn, heightened fears of miscegenation, which might lead to the “degradation” of the nation.85 In eighteenth-century England, these fears centered around the preponderance of Black men and their relationship with white women.86 In the nineteenth-century, attention shifted to the Black female body. In England, this was prompted in part by the exhibition in 83 Sue Peabody, There Are No Slaves in France: The Political Culture of Race and Slavery in the Ancien Régime (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 4. 84 See Susan H. Libby, “The Color of Frenchness: Racial Identity and Visuality in French Anti-Slavery Imagery, 1788–1794,” in Blacks and Blackness in European Art of the Long Nineteenth Century, ed. Adrienne L. Childs and Susan H. Libby (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2014), 18–45, especially 22. 85 For these concerns in England, see Edwards and Walvin, Black Personalities, 20–22, and Catherine Molineux, Faces of Perfect Ebony: Encountering Slavery in Imperial Britain (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012), 260–265. For France, see the analysis of visual culture referencing Sarah Baartman in Robin Mitchell, “Another Means of Understanding the Gaze: Sarah Bartmann in the Development of NineteenthCentury French National Identity,” in Black Venus 2010: They Called Her “Hottentot”, ed. Deborah Willis (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2010), 38. 86 For the higher proportion of Black men relative to women in England, see Edwards and Walvin, Black Personalities, 20–22.

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1810 in London of a Khoi woman, Saartjie (Sarah) Baartman, whom I will shortly discuss. In Paris, anxiety was focused on the visible presence of black prostitutes on the city streets.87 Fear therefore intermingled with desire. Within this matrix, by the early nineteenth century in both England and France, the figure of the “Black Venus” emerged as the locus of concern. Well theorized by Sander Gilman, T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting, Robin Mitchell, Charmaine Nelson, and Janell Hobson, among others, the “Black Venus” constructed and cemented the association of Black women with sexual promiscuity, as both the object and agent of desire.88 Yet, as Charmaine Nelson has argued, “Black female subjects were doubly marginalized,” the “ultimate other.”89 Moreover, the very concept of the “Black Venus” was replete with irony because it perverted the classical ideal.90 In her study of classical sculpture in early-­n ineteenth-­c entury Britain, Cora 87 For Paris, see Viktoria Schmidt-Linsenhoff, “Who Is the Subject? Marie-Guilhelmine Benoist’s Portrait d’une negresse,” in Slave Portraiture in the Atlantic World, ed. Agnes Lugo-Ortiz and Angela Rosenthal (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 329. 88 See Sander L. Gilman, “Black Bodies, White Bodies: Toward an Iconography of Female Sexuality in Late Nineteenth-Century Art, Medicine, and Literature,” Critical Inquiry 12.1 (Autumn 1985): 204–242; T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting, Black Venus: Sexualized Savages, Primal Fears, and Primitive Narratives in French (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999); Janell Hobson, Venus in the Dark: Blackness and Beauty in Popular Culture (New York: Routledge, 2005); Charmaine A. Nelson, Representing the Black Female Subject in Western Art (New York: Routledge, 2010), especially “‘Venus Africaine’: Race, Beauty and African-ness,” 158–169; Robin Mitchell, Vénus Noire: Black Women and Colonial Fantasies in Nineteenth-Century France (Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2020). 89 Nelson, Representing the Black Female, 5. 90 Schmidt-Linsenhoff, “Who Is the Subject?” 331; and Mitchell, Vénus Noire, 37.

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Gilroy-Ware has argued that classical sculpture lost its “universal” implications and thus its relevance, which “threatened the introduction a new type of classical body.”91 Yet the “new type of classical body” to which Gilroy-Ware referred was rarely depicted in sculpture. In art, at least, the “Black Venus” remained a concept in name only. When the “Black Venus” was employed or referred to as a type, it almost always referred to a real Black woman, and the Black woman in turn was compared to a “white” sculpture of Venus—or, a sculpture of “white” Venus, if you will, as the two were understood to be one and the same. I will return later to the comparison between real women and sculpture, but the racially charged juxtapositions between Black women and classical sculpture often utilized Canova’s works as a referent. For instance, in 1815, during a trip to Philadelphia, Baron de Montlezun commented on the beauty of the (enslaved?) servant, “Betsy,” whom he described as an “African Venus,” whose “forms” could provide “all that was most seductive to the imagination of poets, which sculpture created most perfectly, and which was touched by the most gracious brushes of the most talented painters, from Homer to the Abbey de Lille, from Phidias to Canova, from Apelles to Raphael.”92 Yet, Betsy’s beauty was not perfect, for Montlezun was equally careful to point out that her features were marred by her “almost hideous” mouth.93 By 1855, reflecting on the subjective standards 91 Cora Gilroy-Ware, The Classical Body in Romantic Britain (London: Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 2020), 136 and 158. 92 Baron de Montlezun, Souvenirs des Antilles: Voyage en 1815 et 1816, aux États-Unis, et dans l’archipel Caraïbe aperçu de Philadelphie et New-York; descriptions de la Trinidad, la Grenade, Saint-Vincent, Sainte-Lucie, Martinique, Guadeloupe, Marie-Galan, 2 vols. (Paris: Gide Fils, 1818), vol. 1, 111–112. 93 Ibid., vol. 1, 112.

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of beauty, Thomas Nichols would argue that such a comparison was impossible: “[N]o one, not even a Hottentot will pretend that the Hottentot Venus is as beautiful as those of Titian or Canova, Apelles or Praxiteles.”94 In these comparisons, the “Black Venus” was doomed twice over. She was not only “not white.” She was also emphatically “not sculpture.” When the “Black Venus” was invoked, therefore, she was often a cultural, scientific, anthropological anomaly—not a work of art. With this in mind, then, we might reevaluate beholders’ concerns about Canova’s tinted surface. On the one hand, the form and color of his sculptures (“whiteness” writ large) set the standard for beauty.95 This was the primary interpretation of Canova’s works. Yet, the tinted surface suggests alternate readings. The color Canova applied might register as additive in nature. The red lips and cheeks might represent a natural flush or suggest the artifice of makeup.96 The yellowed marble might be read as “dirty” or sullied, an effect heightened by the context of the bath.97 At the same time, however, the yellowed surface might be read 94 Thomas L. Nichols, Woman, In All Ages and Nations; A Complete and Authentic History of the Manners and Customs, Character and Condition of the Female Sex, in Civilized and Savage Countries, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time (New York: Fowlers and Wells, 1855), 17. 95 See David Bindman, Warm Flesh, Cold Marble: Canova, Thorvaldsen, and Their Critics (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014), esp. 128–136. David Bindman has discussed how neoclassical sculptors such as Canova and Thorvaldsen “can be seen to reinforce the value of whiteness in both its physical and symbolic sense.” 96 For the way makeup was viewed “with suspicion,” see Angela Rosenthal, “Visceral Culture: Blushing and the Legibility of Whiteness in Eighteenth-Century British Portraiture,” Art History 27.4 (2007), 585. 97 Augustin Creuze de Lesser, for instance, thought the Venus in Canova’s Venus and Adonis looked “all gray.” Creuze de Lesser, Voyage en Italie et en Sicile, 314.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

as intrinsic to the figure and thus interpreted as “non-white” skin, threatening to collapse the racial difference which (white) marble sculpture otherwise established and upheld. (That such a “misreading” might be possible is evident from one surprising review of Isabella Teotocchi Albrizzi’s biography of Canova. Following a section on relief sculpture, the author compared Canova’s “too learned” use of mixed media in his Hebe to silhouette profiles painted “to give lightness to the hair, and whiteness to the shirt and cravat.”98 While criticizing the practice for blurring the boundaries between profiles and paintings, the author points out that “as the shirt, white in reality, is given white on the paper, we naturally infer that the face, black on paper, is also black in reality.”99) To be clear, I do not want to overstate the connection between Canova’s tinted surfaces and these racial debates. More often than not, Canova’s works were used to hold up the ideal of whiteness. And despite the concerns of the previously cited reviewer, there are not, to my knowledge, comparisons that directly suggest Canova’s Venus was a “Black Venus” or which see in her figure a woman of “mixed race”; Canova’s Venus Italica is a far cry from John Bell’s 1868 Octoroon.100 Yet, as we shall see later in this 98 “Art IV Opere di scultura, ed di plastrea [sic] Antonio Canova descritte dal Isabella Albrozzi [sic] nata Testochi [sic] Firenze,” The British Critic: A New Series IV, July–December (Nov. 1815): 499. 99 Ibid., 500. This is also clearly a misunderstanding of Canova’s sculptural surface, because the author imagines the drapery to be heightened with white, thus making the “skin” appear darker, whereas in reality it was the “skin” that was tinted and the drapery left its natural color. 100 Charmaine A. Nelson, “White Marble, Black Bodies and the Fear of the Invisible Negro: Signifying Blackness in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Neoclassical Sculpture,” in Representing the Black Female Subject in Western Art (New York: Routledge, 2010), 139–157; and Mia L. Bagneris,

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chapter, the undercurrents of racial bias and the determination to establish racial difference were so powerful that they cannot be ignored. They reappeared repeatedly in unexpected ways in the discourse on sculpture. The controversial nature of polychromy led both Canova and his champions to distance him from this practice as his career progressed. But even as they distanced Canova from these treatments, his supporters continued to insist that Canova’s greatest trait as a sculptor was his ability to create the appearance of “vera carne” or “real flesh.” The emphasis on Canova’s workmanship and the reiteration of the “softness” of his work, however, inadvertently damned him. Reinforcing the carnal nature of Canova’s carving and the marble’s softness, or morbidezza, linked the neoclassical artist to the most maligned Baroque sculptor—GianLorenzo Bernini.

che esce dal bagno,” describes the way Venus emerged, soft (molle) and clean, from the sea, and Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi repeated the trope three times, delighting in “the soft brilliancy of the skin.”102 Her soft skin was echoed by the “seducing softness and eloquence in her looks” and her “softer and more joyous emotions,” all of which “adds […] greatly to [her] female charms.”103 And, as in the Pygmalion myth, the Venus Italica’s flesh “seems as if it would yield to the pressure of the finger.”104 The softness of Canova’s sculptures gave the impression of “flesh, it is life animated by passions.”105 This softness was evident not just in the final work but was embodied the making of the work as well. Modern scholars such as Christopher Johns, for instance, have argued that even the preparatory drawings for the Venus Italica showcase Canova’s exploration of the three-dimensional nature of the statue and the

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102 Melchior Missirini, “Venere che esce dal bagno. Statua alquanto maggiore della Venere Medicea eseguita per la Real Galleria di Firenze,” in Sui marmi di Antonio Canova, versi (Venice: Picotti, 1817), 26; and Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, Leopoldo Cicognara, and Henry Moses, The Works of Antonio Canova in Sculpture and Modelling, Engraved in Outline by Henry Moses’ with Descriptions from the Italian of the Countess Albrizzi, and a Biographical Memoir by Count Cicognara, 2 vols. (London: Septimus Prowett), vol. 1, n.p., respectively. 103 Albrizzi, Cicognara, and Moses, The Works of Antonio Canova, vol. 1, n.p. 104 Edmund Dorr Griff in, “Tour through Italy and Switzerland,” in Remains of the Rev. Edmund D. Griffin, ed. Francis Griffin, 2 vols. (New York: G. & C. & H. Carvill, T. & J. Swords, E. Bliss, and O. Halsted, 1831), vol. 1, 208–209. 105 See Simond, A Tour in Italy and Sicily, 220, and “Some Extracts from the Manuscript Journal of a Traveller in Italy,” The Scots Magazine and Edinburgh Literary Miscellany New Series, LXXXIV, V, part II (July–Dec. 1819): 413. The French original of Simon’s text does not include this statement. It has been added to the English translation, and repeated, with a slightly different translation, in extracts included in a Scottish journal.

Morbidezza was one—if not the—def ining hallmark of Canova’s female sculptures. Morbidezza, mollesse, softness—visitors from every European nation repeated the trope of soft flesh, particularly where the Venus Italica was concerned. The 1812 poems published in her honor emphasize her “soft and long limbs”; “the body expresses such lifelike and true flesh that to beholders, it seems it would cede to the touch.”101 Melchior Missirini’s poem, “Venere “Miscegenation in Marble: John Bell’s Octoroon,” The Art Bulletin 102.2 (June 2020): 64–90. (The sculptor John Bell (1812-1895) is not to be confused with the surgeon John Bell (1763-1820) referenced earlier.) 101 Giovanni Anguillesi, “Endecasillabo,” in Per la Venere Italica scolpita da Antonio Canova. Versi d’autori Toscani (Pisa: F. Didot, 1812), 7, and “Descrizione della statua,” in ibid., vi, respectively.

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Fig. 3.10: Michelangelo, St. Matthew (detail), 1505–1506. Marble, h. 271 cm. Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Anatomizing the Female Nude

soft roundness of her curves.106 Likewise, Peter Rockwell, Norman Rockwell’s grandson and a sculptor in his own right, compares Canova’s supple contours to the harsh chisel marks of Michelangelo’s non-finito107 (Fig. 3.10). For Rockwell, it is clear that Canova imagined his sculptures as a composite act. The act of modeling and building up the form is visible in the finished marble more than an assault on the stone.108 Nineteenth-century analyses were more lyrical. The Countess of Blessington, when viewing the Venus Italica, stated that she could not look at Canova’s female statues without remembering that his first sculpture was purportedly made of butter. “There is an appearance of softness about them,” she continued, “—strange as it may be to attribute the semblance of such a quality to so hard a substance as marble, that makes them look as if modelled by the hand in some malleable substance, rather than chiseled in marble.”109 For Quatremère de Quincy, the “softness of the flesh had a workmanship that made every idea of workmanship disappear, and that could only be defined by the idea of creation.”110 He credited Canova with nearly divine powers of invention, obfuscating the realities of sculptural production. Softness thus emerged in Canova’s sculpture in two ways: the act of making the work and the seeming malleability of the marble itself. Although nineteenth-century writers presented this aspect of Canova’s work as ex-novo, suggesting he surpassed antique artists and all others 106 Christopher Johns, “The Conceptualization of Form and the Modern Sculptural Masterpiece: Canova’s Drawings for ‘Venus Italica’,” Master Drawings 41.2 (Summer 2003): 128–139. 107 See Peter Rockwell, Stanley Rosenfeld, and Heather Hanley, The Compleat Marble Sleuth (Sunny Isles Beach, FL: Rockrose, 2004), 164. 108 Ibid., 203. 109 Blessington, The Idler in Italy, vol. 2, 139. 110 Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages, 139.

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who came before him, morbidezza was a valued sculptural quality which originated in Renaissance art theory.111 It was, however, popularized in the seventeenth century when it became most closely associated with the (eventually much maligned) Bernini.112 Bernini achieved softness through chisel work, for which he was much admired, and he also may have polished the marble surface. There is evidence, for instance, that a waxy patina was applied to the flesh of Bernini’s Apollo and Daphne in the seventeenth century.113 Even the remarkable effect of Pluto’s hand on Proserpina’s thigh was enhanced by a stain applied to her body, dramatizing the distinction between his hard grip and her soft flesh114 (Fig. 3.11). Moreover, morbidezza and the resemblance to flesh were the qualities Bernini emphasized to distinguish himself from the pervasive presence of Michelangelo. In one frequently cited criticism of the Old Master, Paul Fréart de Chantelou suggested that Michelangelo, despite his incredible knowledge of anatomy, was not successful at sculpting women. (Bernini, of 111 Karl Möseneder, “‘Morbido, Morbidezza’: Zum Begriff und zur Realisation des ‘Weichen’ in der Plastik des Cinquecento,” in Docta Manus: Studien zur Italienischen Skulptur für Joachim Poeschke, ed. Johannes Myssok, Jürgen Wiener, and Joachim Poeschke (Münster: Rhema, 2007), 289–299. 112 See Frédéric Cousinié, “Le Bernin et l’Europe: Du baroque triomphant à l’âge romantique,” in De la morbidezza du Bernin au “sentiment de la chair” dans la sculpture française, ed. Chantal Grell et al. (Paris: L’université de Paris-Sorbonne, 2002), 283–302; Joris Van Gastel, Il marmo spirante: Sculpture and Experience in Seventeenth-Century Rome (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2012), 283–302. 113 See Kristina Herrmann Fiore, “Apollo e Dafne del Bernini al tempo del Cardinale Scipione Borghese,” in “Apollo e Dafne” del Bernini nella Galleria Borghese, ed. Kristina Herrmann Fiore and Araldo de Luca (Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 1997), 98. 114 Genevieve Warwick, Bernini: Art as Theatre (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 109.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fig. 3.11: Gian-Lorenzo Bernini, The Rape of Persephone (detail), 1621–1622. Marble, 255 cm (without base). Galleria Borghese, Rome, Italy. Photo © Andrea Jemolo / Bridgeman Images

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course, was a master of sculpting women in every genre.) Yet in Bernini’s retort to Chantelou, it was not just the gender of the represented figure that was an issue—it was that Michelangelo could not transform the marble into flesh.115 By the eighteenth century, however, the “sentiment de chair” became a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it was the very thing that distinguished the ancients from the moderns and proved the superiority of the latter. In the seventeenth century, Pierre Cureau de la Chambre, for instance, claimed that Bernini’s only deviation from the antique was that he gave his f igures “more movement and more life, more tenderness and truth […] and that he removed the hardness of marble (which he softened with his chisel) and gave it a lightness and a transparency so that one believed one was looking at and touching flesh.”116 In the early part of the eighteenth century, this aspect of Bernini’s work was praised by a number of critics and connoisseurs, including the Comte de Caylus and Denis Diderot, among others.117 On the other hand, as Frédéric Cousinié has shown, excessive softness and the successful rendering of flesh in sculpture was also seen as overstepping mimetic boundaries.118 Like polychromy and the stained surface, morbidezza threatened the art of sculpture by making it appear too close to “the thing itself” and by tempting the gaze—and touch—of amateurs. These were, of course the very things for which Canova himself was criticized a century later. The emphasis on softness damaged Canova’s reputation in three ways. First, the praise Canova

received for carving techniques—for his ability to achieve softness in hard stone—contributed to the general belief that Canova was good at execution, but not invention. We have already seen this in the relationship between the Triumphant Perseus and the Apollo Belvedere; the problem was exacerbated by the Venus Italica. She was praised for the softness of her skin but maligned for her lack of originality. She was, in effect, a mere imitation of the Venus de’Medici, “more to be admired for delicacy of finishing, than for expression or conception of general form.”119 Secondly, morbidezza caused sculpture to vacillate between real and ideal. The illusion of living flesh, in turn, contributed to the admiration of amateurs. Overcome by both curiosity and desire, they wanted to reach out and touch the stone to see if it would yield to their hand. Over and over again, for viewers admiring Canova’s works, “looking” became “touching.” Recall the Marchesa Boccapaduli’s reaction to Venus and Adonis; forgetting that it was marble, she could not resist impinging on the lovers’ embrace.120 A French countess likewise ran her hands over one of Canova’s ideal heads; “[I]t was,” she sighed, “made to be caressed.”121 The Venus Italica inspired similar responses. In 1812, the poet Ugo Foscolo viewed the sculpture in the Tribuna of Florence’s Uffizi shortly after it had been installed and contrasted Canova’s “beautiful woman” with the “goddess,” the Venus de’Medici. When Foscolo recorded his encounter in a letter to Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi in 1812, the memory alone made his hand tremble. He had not been able to resist

115 Cited in Cousinié, “Le Bernin et l’Europe,” 286; and Van Gastel, “Il marmo spirante,” 143. 116 Cited in Caroline van Eck, Art, Agency and Living Presence: From the Animated Image to the Excessive Object (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015), 41. 117 Cousinié, “Le Bernin et l’Europe,” 287–288. 118 Ibid., 289–296.

119 William Hazlitt, Notes of a Journey through France and Italy (London: Hunt and Clarke, 1826), 205. 120 Cited in Paola Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli: Tra collezionismo e mercato (Naples: Paparo, 2002), 149–150. 121 F. L. [F. le Normand], Lettres à Jennie, sur Montmorency, l’Hermitage, Andilly, Saint Leu, Chantilly, Ermenonville, et les environs (Paris: Nicole, 1818), 117–119.

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reaching out to “flirt, kiss […] and even caress” the statue.122 He was by no means alone. The difficulty presented by Canova’s Venus—and any representation of the nude, particularly the female nude—was that tactile engagement with the work always threatened to devolve into something lewd. This “dangerous” aspect of Canova’s work had been understood for years by no less than Jacques-Louis David, who warned his students to not be seduced by Canova’s works.123 It was also a trope in the reception of sculpture: consider the oft repeated tale attributed to Lucian of the young man who left a stain on the buttock of the Aphrodite of Knidos.124 There were good reasons why custodians and guard rails were needed to protect the Venus de’Medici in both the Uffizi and the Louvre, and why Canova’s Venus—and her viewers—were subject to the same scrutiny. By 1841, when Louis-Augustin d’Hombres-Firmas viewed the Venus Italica in the Palazzo Pitti, she was “encircled by a barrier that was closed with a small lock, for which the inspector of the gallery had the keys.”125 Although he would turn the Venus Italica for viewers if one asked, “one could no longer touch the statue, as one could

122 Cited in Ugo Foscolo, “Lettere,” in Opere edite e postume, ed. F. S. Orlandini and E. Mayer (Florence: Successori Le Monnier, 1899), vol. 2, 375–376. 123 Cited in Hugh Honour, “Canova’s Studio Practice I: The Early Years,” The Burlington Magazine 114.828 (March 1972): 159. 124 Lucian, “Affairs of the Heart (Amores),” in Lucian, trans. M. D. Macleod, 8 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), vol. 8, LCL 432, pp. 169–177. DOI: 10.4159/DLCL.lucian-affairs_heart_amores.1967. 125 Louis-Augustin d’Hombres-Firmas, “Arrangement des objets d’art dans les musées d’Italie,” in Recueil de mémoires et d’observations de physique, de météorologie, d’agriculture, et d’histoire naturelle, vol. 5, Mélanges (Nîmes: Ballivet e Fabre, 1842–1844), 160. Many thanks to Muriel Riochet at the Institut national d’histoire de l’art for helping me track down this rare book.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

with others,” and as a result, she “preserved her purity and the freshness of a new work.”126 In a period that was increasingly relying upon Kant’s concept of disinterestedness as an aesthetic model for the approach to works of art, the softness of Canova’s female figures and his Venus were a threat. As codification of proper behavior in viewing practices coincided with the institutionalization of art within the museum, practices that altered engagement with the art object from a visual one to a tactile one were increasingly frowned upon. Canova’s Venus presented a problem. Her modernity— her identity as a bathing woman, in a private boudoir, endlessly repeated and showcased in the mirrors surrounding her—transformed voyeuristic delight in the body of the female nude into a potentially dangerous encounter. As David Bindman has argued, even the recognition of the tactile nature of sculpture “makes the visual exploration of the sculptured f igures analogous to sexual caressing.”127 Thus, the delight viewers took in the Venus Italica—whether tactile or optical—could be lascivious. Heinrich Heine lauded her as “the greatest beauty in the nineteenth century” and dreamt he was making love to her.128 Antoine Claude Pasquin declared her to be a “boudoir figure which speaks more to the sense than the soul.”129 There was “something voluptuous” about her, “which attracts us by feelings of a character far less pure, and far less elevated than those which the Venus of the Tribune inspires.”130 She was aware of her nudity 126 Ibid. 127 See Bindman, Warm Flesh, Cold Marble, 91. 128 For Heine’s reaction to the Venus Italica, see Honour, “Canova’s Statues of Venus,” 670. 129 M. Valery, Historical, Literary, and Artistic Travels in Italy, 373. 130 “Notes on the Gallery in Florence. Extracted from My Portfolio,” The Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany; A New Series of Scots Magazine, vol. XVI (May 1825): 525.

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and her own beauty; this “consciousness of sex,” as the English translation of Louis Simond’s travel diary put it, was such that she was “more admired by a certain class of amateurs.”131 The Venus Italica’s awareness of her body was paralleled by her beholders’ embodied experience and acknowledgment of their own physical presence. This brings me to the final point regarding the threat “softness” had on Canova’s reputation. Morbidezza, as I have already mentioned, was closely associated with Bernini and the Baroque. By the end of the eighteenth century, however, Bernini was accused of having destroyed the art of sculpture. His theatrical and overly sensual work deviated from the “noble calm and simple grandeur” of antiquity. Canova, on the other hand, was sculpture’s savior. It was he who “revived” the medium. And yet, Canova’s works too were sensual, seductive, soft. Carl Ludwig Fernow, Canova’s greatest German critic, complained that in many of Canova’s sculptures “softness is pushed to the point of slackness, [and] the charm of the material is driven to the point of repulsion”; these qualities likened him to Bernini.132 By 1836, Cyprien Robert wrote, “[I]n terms of the softness of contours and sensual seduction, there is nothing comparable. […] Responding like Bernini to sensual needs, only more refined, Canova, was named, like him, a Phidias, for an age of flesh and blood.”133 Even common tourists recognized that if one looked closely at Canova’s work, one would find “Bernini in the details.”134 In contrast, the most 131 Simond, A Tour in Italy and Sicily, 89. 132 For a few examples, see Fernow, “Über den Bildhauer Canova,” 65, 71, 88, and 236–237. 133 Cyprien Robert, Essai d’une philosophie de l’art (Paris: de Hachette, 1836), 173. 134 “Walks in Rome and Its Environs. No. XVI. Roman Art—Canova,” The New Monthly Magazine and Literary Journal Part 1. Original Papers (1829): 30.

severe neoclassical artists emphasized outline, sharp contours, whiteness. Theirs was an art of “deincarnation,” which not only denied the corporeality of the object, but also the physicality of the beholder.135 They short-circuited the sensual response in favor of the aesthetic. Canova’s softness and attention to flesh, however, refuted deincarnation. He insisted on the physical presence of his sculptures and the beholder’s equivalent recognition of his own body, his own desires, and his own animal presence. This was, in effect, a challenge to the very premise of neoclassicism, and for many, his greatest failing. Canova’s insistence on the material nature of the body opened the door for a new understanding of morbidezza in which the soft flesh of the sculptural body was subject to anatomical analysis.

The Anatomy of Sculpture The idea that the sculptural body was a penetrable one, that it held the potential for life—for interiority, if you will—was inherent to the medium. In antiquity, several myths recounted tales of transubstantiation from inanimate to animate object. Ovid’s Pygmalion, from his Metamorphoses (8 AD), was among the most famous.136 The search for the life spark preoccupied artists and philosophers for centuries, but perhaps never more so than the eighteenth century, when a profound preoccupation with the Pygmalion myth merged with philosophical theories of animation. Most eighteenth-century materialist philosophies revolved around a central idea—namely, given that all matter is made of the same atoms, 135 Cousinié, “Le Bernin et l’Europe,” 301. 136 Victor Ieronim Stoichita, The Pygmalion Effect: From Ovid to Hitchcock (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008).

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it is only the difference in the structure or arrangement of the atoms that differentiates animate from inanimate objects. It should be possible to use some sort of transforming energy to alter the atomic structure of dead, or non-living, matter and produce life.137 Often, sculptures were used as the example of inanimate matter that could be transformed, presumably because of their lifelike form. In his 1754 Treatise on the Sensations, for instance, the Abbé de Condillac envisioned an experiment in which a statue experiences each of the five senses individually, in succession, and then in combination with one another. In his dedication, he asks us to imagine “a statue constructed internally like ourselves, and animated by a mind which as yet had no ideas of any kind.”138 As the senses are activated by him, the statue experiences cognition and memory; in effect, the statue comes alive. De Condillac imagines the marble exterior of the statue as a barrier which prevents the use of the senses until it is breached by him. In his vision, the statue is effectively a shell, not a solid, impenetrable mass. Given the widespread interest in animation, the concomitant popularity of the Pygmalion myth during the eighteenth century is no surprise. Andreas Blühm cites 142 examples of the myth in theater and the fine arts between 1500 and 1900, with more than half of them created between 1700 and 1800.139 In Ovid’s version of the myth, Pygmalion creates the statue of a 137 See George L. Hersey, Falling in Love with Statues: Artificial Humans from Pygmalion to the Present (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009), 99–102; and Marquard Smith, The Erotic Doll: A Modern Fetish (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013), 39. 138 Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, Condillac’s “Treatise on the Sensations”, ed. and trans. Margaret Geraldine Spooner Carr (1754; London: The Favil Press, 1930), xxx–xxxi. 139 As cited in Hersey, Falling in Love with Statues, 102.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

beautiful woman out of ivory. He is so enamored of her that he caresses her, gives her gifts, and asks Venus for a bride similar to his ivory girl. Venus, hearing his plea, gives the statue life so that the stone “lost its hardness, altering under [Pygmalion’s] fingers, as the bees’ wax of Hymettus softens in the sun, and is moulded, under the thumb, into many forms.” But malleable flesh is not the only way that the statue’s animation is recorded—her “pulse throbbed under his thumb” and when he kisses her, she blushes.140 Soft flesh, in tandem with coursing blood, signifies life, and takes on greater significance when considering the background of the Pygmalion myth. Often forgotten about Ovid’s story is the reason Pygmalion initially makes the statue: he was celibate because he had been “offended by” the Propoetides, women of the city of Amathus. The Propoetides had dared to reject Venus as their deity. As punishment, she forced them to prostitute themselves. They lost their sense of shame, and, as a result, their ability to blush; “the blood hardened in their cheeks, and only a small change turned them into hard flints.”141 When their blood stopped circulating, they were, essentially, turned to stone. Blushing becomes a symbol for the living body in eighteenth-century versions of the myth. Color suggested that the interior of the sculpture had been transformed. Within the marble shell now turned flesh, a heart was beating, and blood was circulating. In paintings of Pygmalion, it became routine to signify Galatea’s transformation from sculpture to living woman by juxtaposing pink flesh with white stone. Jean Raoux (1717), Louis-Jean 140 Ovid, Metamorphoses, trans. Anthony S. Kline, Book X, 243–297, “Orpheus Sings: Pygmalion and the Statue,” http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph10.htm. 141 Ibid., Book X, 220–242, “Orpheus Sings: The Propoetides,” http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph10. htm.

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Fig. 3.12: Jean Raoux, Pygmalion, 1717. Oil on canvas, 128 × 97 cm. Musée Fabre, Montpellier, France. © Musée Fabre de Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole / photographie Frédéric Jaulmes – Reproduction interdite sans autorisation

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Lagrenée (1777), Laurent Pécheux (1784), and Louis Gauffier (1797), to name only a few, all rendered the transformative moment the same way (Fig. 3.12). Pink stood for vitality, a trope repeated in nineteenth- and twentieth-century depictions of the myth as well. One of the best known, for example, is the painting by AnneLouis Girodet from 1817, which was itself an homage to Canova. By the early nineteenth century, then, it was common to merge rhetoric about “living” statuary with sensuality and anatomical verisimilitude. Canova’s tinted surfaces naturally caused viewers to comment on the “skin” of his sculptures; their “epidermis” glistened and contrasted with the unvarnished drapery. This focus was not only in keeping with Canova’s attentiveness to his surfaces, but also reflected the late-eighteenth- and early-nineteenthcentury fascination with skin. As I have already discussed, by the early nineteenth century skin—and its color—became the most visible way of reiterating racial difference. The act of blushing, central to the Pygmalion myth and to the discussion of animation, was not just a signif ier of feminine modesty. As Angela Rosenthal has shown, it too was implicated in the hierarchization of whiteness.142 Blushing presupposed and depended on “white” skin, which rendered the blush visible. Black skin, in contrast, was believed to be “too dark” to show a blush, a belief that contributed to the stereotype of the highly sexualized Black female who did not experience shame.143 Gendered, racialized, moralized, aestheticized, and politicized—the manifold significance of skin was grounded in new anatomical studies. As Mechthild Fend has pointed out, neoclassicism’s attentiveness to the “safeguarding of the [body’s] boundaries” led to

142 See Rosenthal, “Visceral Culture,” 563–592. 143 See Ibid., 575.

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

a concomitant interest in the epidermis as a site of physiological and psychological inquiry.144 Skin was, quite literally, the boundary of the body. Yet, as we have seen, one of the criticisms of Canova’s sculptures was that they seemed to lack a strong outline. Instead, the serpentine curves, dissolving contours, and surface treatments of Canova’s sculptures seemed decidedly anti-neoclassical. The criticism of J. Coindet in his Histoire de peinture en Italie summarized this tension in Canova’s work. Comparing Canova’s sculptures to those of Bertel Thorvaldsen, Coindet wrote: “Under Canova’s chisel, marble comes to life; it seems as if blood circulates in the delicately rendered veins, but it is a soft, voluptuous life; nerves become flesh, muscles lose their vigor, and the bones lose their hardness.”145 Canova’s works, once again, were seen as “too soft,” but now “softness” took on new anatomical significance.146 Canova’s sculptures’ “skin” therefore became another signifier of the marble’s “softness” and as a result, viewers who commented on Canova’s sculptures rarely stopped with the epidermal surface. The waxed and colored surfaces did not arrest the viewers’ gaze. Instead, their understanding of the surface as skin, and of the sculpture’s potential animation, led them to speculate on what lay below the marble surface. The stone that viewers saw might not be solid and unyielding after all. It might be mere surface, a permeable epidermis, containing the messy, if vital, reality of the body. And reactions to Canova’s work do suggest an understanding 144 Fend, Fleshing out Surfaces, 107. 145 J. Coindet, Histoire de la peinture en Italie, vol. 1 (Geneva: Joël Cherbuliez, 1849), 180. 146 The connection between Canova’s sculptures’ “softness” and anatomy is driven home by the reference to his works in a medical dictionary under “morbidesse.” Félix Vicq-d’Azyr and Jacques-Louis Moreau, eds., Encyclopédie méthodique. Médecine, vol. 10 (Paris: Agasse, 1821), 277–278.

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that the surface of his sculptures would not just yield to the touch but could also be breached. In his Panegyric to Canova, Pietro Giordani praised Canova’s nudes for showing us not just their “soft and lustrous skin, but the veins underneath the skin.”147 When Giuseppe Lucchesi Palli saw Venus and Adonis in 1795, he was moved to do more than simply touch the work. “The marble is treated with such industriousness,” he wrote, “that the surface positively seems to be human skin, and one is tempted to prick it with a pin to see if it bleeds.”148 Augustin Creuze de Lesser’s response to Venus and Adonis’ polychromy was less complimentary. He was initially confused by what he saw—what he described as “gray” flesh juxtaposed against a “white” cloth. This cloth, he believed, was a piece of fabric draped around the goddess for modesty’s sake. When he got closer, he realized his mistake. The piece was, of course, all marble and “this cloth was positioned in such a way that unless it was held in place by pins stuck in the flesh of Venus herself, it was impossible for it to stay on.”149 Both Creuze de Lesser and Lucchesi Palli read the marble surface as a penetrable skin that could be pierced. The red tint Canova used on his female sculptures’ cheeks and lips also lent itself to misinterpretation. More than a decade after the unveiling of Venus and Adonis, a critic of the 1808 Salon referred to the “rather strong carmine tint on the interior of Hebe’s mouth.”150 Given that Hebe’s lips are barely parted, it appears that this critic misread Hebe’s “lipstick” as an orifice; in so doing, he suggested that the sculpture’s interior was composed of soft tissue.

The Venus Italica was subject to the same analysis, and visitors imagined the complex human anatomy and coursing blood that lay beneath her skin. Veins in the marble augmented the effect. They were not seen as defects, but rather as marks of anatomical verisimilitude. Comparing the reception of Canova’s Venus with his Polinnia, which had similar imperfections, Leopoldo Cicognara noted that he had overheard women admiring Polinnia and “prais[ing] the artist, for [reproducing] even the thin blue veins that appeared on the back of her feet beneath the soft skin.”151 In 1819, Basile-Joseph Ducos made similar comments regarding the “alabaster-like transparency” of Venus’ surface, which resembled flesh. “The blue vein that one finds on her right shoulder,” he wrote, “rather than destroying the illusion, on the contrary, augments it: these are the same veins that one notices on the thigh of the Apollo Belvedere.”152 Anatomical studies and sculpture—particularly classical sculpture—have been intertwined since the early modern period. Artistic training was dominated by the study of classical sculptures, Old Master paintings, and the live model. Dissections supplemented this course of study. At times they were conducted independently by artists, such as the experiments by Leonardo, and periodically they were held in medical theaters and exhibited to a broader audience. Artists rendered the body in as much detail as possible, often exploring its anatomy at great length, as Canova himself did, in a little-known series of anatomical studies and, at times, in three dimensions as écorchés, or flayed figures.153

147 Pietro Giordani, “Panegirico ad Antonio Canova [1810],” in Opere di Pietro Giordani, 2nd ed. (Florence: Felice Le Monnier, 1851), vol. 1, 110. 148 Cited in Fardella, Antonio Canova a Napoli, 145. 149 Creuze de Lesser, Voyage en Italie et en Sicile, 313–314. 150 M. B., “Beaux-Arts. Salon de 1808. N. XVIII. Sculpture. M. Canova,” 4.

151 Leopoldo Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua rappresen­ tante la musa Polinnia scolpita dal m. Antonio Canova (Venice: Picotti, 1817), 19–20. 152 B. Ducos, Itinéraire et souvenirs d’un voyage en Italie en 1819 et 1820, 4 vols. (Paris: Dondey-Dupré, 1829), vol. 4, 221. 153 Antonio Canova, Disegni anatomici, ed. Massimo Pantaleoni (Rome: Istituto superiore di sanità, 1949).

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Fig. 3.13: Andreas Vesalius, “Organis Nutritioni, Vigesimasecunda Quinti Libri Figura,” De humani corporis fabrica libri septum, 1543. Basileae: [ex officina Ioannis Oporini, 1543]. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University

Anatomists, in turn, relied on classical sculpture to help give form and legibility to the otherwise foreign and confusing bodily viscera. Andreas Vesalius’ great De humani corporis fabrica libri septum from 1543 included a figure reminiscent of the Belvedere Torso to depict the gastrointestinal system; other plates resemble mutilated

ancient fragments (Fig. 3.13). Other examples are even more explicit. In 1691 Bernardino Genga, professor of anatomy at the Académie de France in Rome, published Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno with plates after Charles Errard depicting the musculature of the Laocoön, the Borghese Gladiator, the Farnese

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Fig. 3.14: “Nella quale so mostrano i muscoli, e le parti, che soggiacciono ai gia indicati membri nell’antecedente tavola,” Plate XIII (based on the Laocoön) from Bernardino Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno. Rome: Domenico de Rossi, herede di Gio. Jacomo de Rossi, 1691. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University

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Fig. 3.15: Plate I from Jean-Galbert Salvage, Anatomie du gladiateur combattant, applicable aux beaux arts; ou, Traité des os, des muscles, du mécanisme de mouvemens, des proportions et des caractères du corps humain. Paris: Auteur, 1812. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Lincoln Kirstein, 1952

Hercules, and the Borghese Faun. The Laocoön, for instance, was shown from multiple viewpoints, amputated and flayed; skeletal studies were also prepared but were not published in the book 154 (Fig. 3.14). Genga’s illustrations were used as models for anatomy books well into the nineteenth century and other artists and 154 Adriano Aymonino and Anne Varick Lauder, Drawn from the Antique: Artists & the Classical Ideal (London: Sir John Soane’s Museum, 2015), 48–49.

anatomists also published similarly ambitious and luxurious treatises.155 In 1812, Jean-Galbert Salvage published an extensive study on the 155 Bernardino Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno (Rome: Domenico de Rossi, 1691). Genga’s 1691 edition was translated into English and published in 1723 and 1767 by John Senex in London. Mimi Cazort, Monique Kornell, and K. B. Roberts, The Ingenious Machine of Nature: Four Centuries of Art and Anatomy (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 1996), 65 and note 97.

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Fig. 3.16: Jean-Galbert Salvage, Écorchés after the Apollo Belvedere, 1806. Plaster, 67 × 34 cm and 67 × 41 × 26 cm, respectively. École national supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris, France. © Beaux-Arts de Paris, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

anatomy of the Borghese Gladiator.156 It began with the analysis of the facial structure of the Apollo Belvedere, and in over twenty additional plates subsequently examined the Gladiator from multiple points of view (Fig. 3.15). Salvage’s 156 Jean-Galbert Salvage, Anatomie du gladiateur combattant, applicable aux beaux-arts; ou, traité des os, des muscles, du mécanisme de mouvemens, des proportions et des caractères du corps humain (Paris: Auteur, 1812).

studies were then, in turn, transformed into three-dimensional plaster models for the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris157 (Fig. 3.16). Stripping these classical sculptures to their core both gave legibility to foreign anatomical form and sought out their underlying structure to explain 157 Philippe Comar, ed., Figures du corps: une leçon d’anatomie à l’École des Beaux-arts (Paris: Beaux-arts de Paris, 2008), 36–37 and 226–229.

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Fig. 3.17: Dessein, Proportions de la Venus de Médicis, Plate XXXVIII from Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc. Paris: Briasson, David, Le Breton, and Durand, 1763. Vol. 20 (vol. 3 of the plates). Courtesy the ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, University of Chicago

Anatomizing the Female Nude

Fig. 3.18: Antonio Canova, Venus de’Medici, n.d. Red chalk on laid pale-blue paper, 50.4 × 36.4 cm. Musei civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy

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Fig. 3.19: Thomas Patch, A Gathering of Dilettanti around the Medici Venus, ca. 1760–1761 Oil on canvas, 147.2 × 238.3 cm. The Brinsley Ford Collection. ©National Trust Images / Creative Commercial Photography. ©The National Trust / Augustine Ford

their beauty.158 That beauty was also to be found in their proportions, which were frequently subject to mathematical and scientific analysis. Gérard Audran’s Proportions du corps humain, mesurées sur les plus belles figures de l’antiquité published in 1683 was, like Genga’s volume, reprinted and adopted by publishers throughout Europe well into the nineteenth century.159 Diderot’s Encyclopedia had several plates dedicated to the proportions of ancient sculptures, as did Jombert’s 1775 Method for Learning Drawing.160 Of course 158 Cazort, The Ingenious Machine of Nature, 65. 159 Aymonino and Lauder, Drawn from the Antique, 45. 160 See Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, eds., “Dessein,” in Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, etc., ed. Robert Morrissey and Glenn Roe (Paris: Briasson, David, Le Breton, and Durand, 1763; University of Chicago: ARTFL Encyclopédie Project, Autumn 2022 Edition), vol. 20 (vol. 3 of the plates), http://encyclopedie.uchicago.edu/; and CharlesAntoine Jombert, Méthode pour apprendre le dessein (Paris: Chez l’auteur, 1755).

it was common for artists to take their own measurements, as Canova himself did. While these examples have focused on male nudes, sculptures of female antiquities were sometimes used. Sculptures of Venus—and the Venus de’Medici in particular—were readily used for the study of proportions. Audran, Diderot, and Jombert all included the proportions of the Venus de’Medici in their treatises (Fig. 3.17). As he had with the Apollo Belvedere, Canova recorded his own analysis of the work’s proportions (Fig. 3.18). The Venus de’Medici’s measurements were so frequently used to establish the paradigm of ideal beauty that artists’ and connoisseurs’ obsession with calculations soon became the source of ridicule, as seen in this mid-eighteenth-century painting by Thomas Patch in which he climbs the pedestal of the Venus de’Medici to measure her with calipers (Fig. 3.19). Rarer, however, are examples of f layed or anatomized female sculptures. The most

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Fig. 3.20: “Tab. Sesta del lib. Tercero,” Plate XXX from Juan Valverde de Amusco, Nicolas Beatrizet, and Gaspar Becerra, Historia de la composicion del cuerpo humano, escrita por Ioan de Valuerde de Hamusco. Rome: Antonio de Salamanca and Antonio Lafrery, 1556. Original source: Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid, Spain. Image from World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/ item/2021666850/

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references were rarely this overt. While the use of the pudica pose, which was common in ancient sculptures of Venus, often appeared in anatomical treatises, fugitive sheets, and flap anatomies, it was also frequently associated with representations of Eve.161 This created a slippage between pagan goddess and biblical ancestor and makes it difficult to identify with certainty the source for some of these images. In the study of female anatomy, classical sculpture held an uneasy place. First, women’s beauty and grace were found in sinuous contour and soft skin—or in the case of sculptures, smooth surfaces. A flayed Venus would not, therefore, shed any further insight into the source of her beauty.162 In Genga’s treatise, illustrated with many examples of flayed heroic male nudes, the Venus de’Medici is only one of two female forms, the other being an Amazon (Fig. 3.21). In Genga’s engraving, the Venus de’Medici is intact, and the plate’s inscription reiterates that she is not shown flayed or anatomized. She has been included because of “the beauty of her contour and the evenness of her surface.”163 Moreover, the softness so admired in women’s bodies was created, in part, by extra subcutaneous fat, which, in turn made them less suitable than men as écorchés. Finally, the lack of female models may also reflect what Thomas Laqueur has dubbed “the theory of one sex.”164

Fig. 3.21: François Andriot after Charles Errard, Statua delle Venere de Medici di veduta in profilo […], Plate XXXX from Bernardino Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno. Rome: Domenico de Rossi, herede di Gio. Jacomo de Rossi, 1691. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University

clearly identif iable sculptural reference is that the Capitoline Venus in Juan Valverde de Amusco’s 1556 treatise on anatomy; the focus is on her pregnant uterus (Fig. 3.20). Yet other

161 See Patricia Simons, “Anatomical Secrets: Pudenda and the Pudica Gesture,” in Das Geheimnis am Beginn der europäischen Moderne, ed. Gisela Engel, Brita Rang, Klaus Reichert and Heide Wunder (Frankfurt: Vittorio Klostermann, 2002), 302–327. 162 Aymonino and Lauder, Drawn from the Antique, 49–50. 163 Genga, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno, plate XXXX, 56. Some editions of this work do not contain the plate of the Venus de’Medici, but the 1723 English edition by John Senex does, with the same caption translated into English. 164 See Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

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Until the eighteenth century, male and female bodies were considered similar in all respects except their reproductive organs. Women’s bodies, therefore, would show nothing unique when anatomized except the uterus—and in rare cases, a fetus. It was, however, fascination with the female body’s reproductive ability and concomitant transformations in anatomy and the representation of the body over the course of the late eighteenth century that allowed viewers to rethink the relationship between sculpture, anatomy, and procreation. While the Pygmalion myth imaginatively enabled viewers to envision potentially animate female sculptures, the medicalization of the medium brought the Pygmalion myth full circle. Not only were sculptures potentially animate, but they could shed light on the reproductive abilities of living women.

Venus and the Clinical Gaze Two significant transformations over the course of the eighteenth century enabled the public to view sculptures like Canova’s Venus differently. First, the “one sex” model was replaced by the “two sex” model; the female body was no longer considered to be a minor deviation from the male, but rather men and women’s anatomies were believed to be inherently different.165 This manifested itself in a new interest in female anatomy and a broad attempt to “define and redefine sex differences in every part of the human body.”166 New attention was paid to women’s interiors. Representations of the female reproductive system, which once University Press, 1992). 165 Ibid. 166 Londa Schiebinger, “Skeletons in the Closet: The First Illustrations of the Female Skeleton in EighteenthCentury Anatomy,” Representations 14 (Spring 1986): 42.

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resembled inverted male genitals, became more clinically accurate and reaffirmed the physical differences between the sexes. 167 Likewise, the first representations of female skeletons appeared.168 This is not to say, however, that objectivity and accuracy completely revolutionized medical illustrations; the standard of perfection established by the proportions of classical sculptures remained unassailable. In William Cheselden’s Osteographia (1733) a female skeleton shared “the same proportions with the Venus de Medicis” and when, in 1796, the German Samuel Thomas von Soemmering sought “universal female traits,” he checked the proportions of his female skeleton against the same sculpture169 (Fig. 3.22). Moreover, even if anatomical representations claimed to illustrate truths about the anatomical differences between men and women, they regularly exaggerated and distorted the proportions of the female body, particularly those parts that were “politically significant,” such as the head and the pelvis.170 Second, these changing ideas of anatomy were hastened by and in turn influenced changing practices of dissection and anatomical display. Dissections in the early modern period fell into two categories: private dissections completed at hospitals and in preparation for embalming and public dissections of executed criminals that occurred in medical theaters.171 The link between dissection and the penal system, and the idea that dissection was the most ignominious treatment for a corpse, is pervasive in the historical imagination in part because of its 167 Laqueur, Making Sex, 79–98 and 154–171. 168 Schiebinger, “Skeletons in the Closet,” 42–82. 169 Cited in ibid., 58. 170 Ibid., 42. 171 Katharine Park, Secrets of Women: Gender, Generation, and the Origins of Human Dissection (New York: Zone Books, 2006).

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Fig. 3.22: The Sceleton [sic] of a Woman, in the Same Proportions with the Venus of Medicis, Plate XXXIV from William Cheselden, Osteographia, or the Anatomy of the Bones. London, [s.n.]: 1733[?]. Medical Historical Library, Harvey Cushing / John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University

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Fig. 3.23: Clemente Susini, Anatomical Venus, 1780–1782. Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università di Firenze, Museo “La Specola,” Florence, Italy. Photo © Raffaello Bencini / Bridgeman Images

sensationalized history in eighteenth-century England, with its legacy of public executions, dissections, grave robbers, and “body snatchers.”172 In Italy it was a different story. Pope Benedict XIV, who reigned from 1740–1758, supported the study of anatomy and dissection in Bologna. He established regular courses of anatomy at the university, the first chair of surgery, and even the first anatomical wax museum.173 Moreover, he actively encouraged the city’s rectors to donate the bodies of their family members to benef it the public good.174 This favorable attitude towards dissection and the display of the dismembered body had far-reaching impact throughout Europe but was most particularly felt in nearby Florence. As part of a broader Enlightenment program, in 1771 Grand Duke Pietro Leopold founded the Royal Museum for 172 See Ruth Richardson, Death, Dissection, and the Destitute (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1987). 173 Lucia Dacome, Malleable Anatomies: Models, Makers, and Material Culture in Eighteenth-Century Italy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 174 Rebecca Messbarger, “The Re-Birth of Venus in Florence’s Royal Museum of Physics and Natural History,” Journal of the History of Collections (2012): 4.

Physics and Natural History, now commonly referred to as “La Specola.” It was—and still is—best known for its collection of anatomical waxes.175 It was also an enormous success and attended by thousands of visitors.176 The display included several rooms filled with cases of wax body parts, as well as now lost full-size wax replicas of two of the most famous works of

175 Giulio Barsanti and Guido Chelazzi, eds. Il Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Volume I: Le collezioni della Specola: zoologia e cere anatomiche = The Museum of Natural History of the University of Florence, Volume I: The Collections of La Specola: Zoology and Anatomical Waxes (Florence: Firenze University Press, 2009). 176 See Renato Mazzolini, “Plastic Anatomies and Artificial Dissections,” in Models: The Third Dimension of Science, ed. Soraya de Chadarevian and Nick Hopwood (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2004), 54; and Marta Poggesi, “La collezione delle cere anatomiche = The Anatomical Wax Collection,” in Il Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Volume I: Le collezioni della Specola: zoologia e cere anatomiche = The Museum of Natural History of the University of Florence, Volume I: The Collections of La Specola: Zoology and Anatomical Waxes, ed. Giulio Barsanti and Guido Chelazzi (Florence: Firenze University Press, 2009), 98.

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Fig. 3.24: Clemente Susini, Anatomical Venus, 1780–1782. Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università di Firenze, Museo “La Specola,” Florence, Italy. Photo credit: Saulo Bambi – Sistema Museale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze

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art in the Uffizi—the Medici Apollo and the Venus de’Medici. The waxes in La Specola reaffirm several anatomical conventions of the period. Male figures depicted muscles and other hard tissues and were rarely covered in skin. Women, on the other hand, were composed of wax in order “to give form to soft and yielding tissues, usually in the abdominal area.”177 Undoubtedly the museum’s most famous object was the Anatomical Venus by Clemente Susini—the only demountable, deconstructable model in the museum178 (Fig. 3.23). With her peach-colored skin, dark hair, red lips, and pearl necklace, the Anatomical Venus was remarkably lifelike. Not only did the contours and flesh of her prone form conform to European (white) standards of ideal beauty, but she was also a paradigm of motherhood; when the final layer of wax is removed her pregnant uterus is revealed179 (Fig. 3.24). The flap-anatomies and small ivory manikins which had originally given beholders the chance to “penetrate” the female body were therefore replaced by these life-size wax models that were seen by an enormous public audience. While anatomy books were a luxurious object that would have been available primarily by subscription, and small manikins were primarily used by physicians as small, portable teaching tools for surgeons and midwives, the museum was open to everyone. In addition, in La Specola, display tactics merged trends from both scientific institutions and the 177 Francesco de Ceglia, “Rotten Corpses, a Disembowelled Woman, a Flayed Man: Images of the Body from the End of the 17th to the Beginning of the 19th Century: Florentine Wax Models in the First-hand Accounts of Visitors,” Perspectives on Science 14.4 (2006), 445. 178 Poggesi, “La collezione delle cere anatomiche,” 91. 179 Lyle Massey, “On Waxes and Wombs: EighteenthCentury Representations of the Gravid Uterus,” in Ephemeral Bodies: Wax Sculpture and the Human Figure, ed. Roberta Panzanelli (Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2008), 83.

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newly founded art museums that were gaining popularity. The standing wax figures were put on rotating pedestals, and although visitors were not encouraged to deconstruct the Anatomical Venus—because a custodian did it for them—she provided the promise of physical access to the work, if only secondhand.180 Yet if the Anatomical Venus was meant to evoke her marble counterpart in the Uffizi, Rebecca Messbarger has shown that the wax model was as much a challenge to the Venus de’Medici as it was a complement.181 Although both represented visions of the ideal female body, the Anatomical Venus’ perfection and proportions were more than skin deep; she provided access to “substantive truths” in the way the Venus de’Medici could not.182 The immense popularity of the wax collections in Florence in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries reflect the way the study of female anatomy became normalized for both male and female middle- and working-class viewers. The knowledge—and titillation—provided by these sculptural forms was further strengthened by the display of real women’s bodies that also occurred during the same period. From the 1780s to the 1820s there was surprising fluidity between women and sculptural forms. In the 1780s, Emma Hamilton performed her “attitudes” of ancient mythological figures, often modeled on classical sculptures, and Amelia Rause has recently argued that fashion trends of the period were also intended to literally fashion women into living statues. 183 Even Canova participated in this trend, and in at least two 180 Anna Maerker, Model Experts: Wax Anatomies and Enlightenment in Florence and Vienna, 1775–1815 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2011), 120 and 123. 181 Messbarger, “The Re-Birth of Venus,” 15. 182 Ibid., 16. 183 Amelia Rauser, The Age of Undress: Art, Fashion, and the Classical Ideal in the 1790s (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2020).

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recorded instances braided the hair of the young women of his hometown, Possagno, so they resembled his statues.184 These examples reinforce the connection between the Pygmalion myth and white femininity, but attitudes and tableaux vivant were forms of private entertainment, enjoyed by small upper- and middle-class audiences in private homes. By the nineteenth century these theatrical performances were transformed into more “scientific” displays of the body. Straddling the line between “science” and “spectacle,” and open to a wide public, human exhibitions were used to reiterate sexual and racial difference.185 One of the earliest, and perhaps the most famous, and tragic cases, is that of Saartjie (or Sarah) Baartman—a Khoi woman from South Africa who was disparagingly known as the “Hottentot Venus.”186 Baartman had the condition steatopygia, an accumulation of fatty tissue that resulted in larger buttocks. She was exhibited as an anatomical curiosity from 1810 to 1814 in London and subsequently in 1814–1815 in Paris, where she was also subject to examination by the leading scientists of the day. Often dressed in clothing that resembled her skin tone so she appeared naked, she was criticized for her lack of intelligence and lack of modesty, creating and reinforcing stereotypes I raised earlier about the hypersexualized Black woman.187 (Of course, 184 Christina Ferando, “Canova as Hairdresser,” The Burlington Magazine CLVI (Jan. 2014): 26–29. 185 See the essays in Pascal Blanchard et al., eds., Human Zoos: Science and Spectacle in the Age of Colonial Empires, trans. Teresa Bridgeman (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2008) and Pascal Blanchard, Gilles Boëtsch, and Nanette Jacomijn Snoep, eds., Human Zoos: The Invention of the Savage, trans. Deke Dusinberre et al. (Paris: Musée du Quai Branly, 2011). 186 See Rachel Holmes, African Queen: The Real Life of the Hottentot Venus (New York: Random House, 2007). 187 For the hypersexualization of Black women generally and Sarah Baartman specifically, see Yvette Abrahams,

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these criticisms did not interrogate the motives of the men responsible for her display or the power dynamics which would have made her refusal near impossible.188) Baartman was the subject of scrutiny, speculation, and ridicule. One caricature from the period shows a group of men measuring her buttocks with calipers, as one would do with sculpture (Fig. 3.25). She was, furthermore, dissected when she died. Her genitalia and reproductive organs were removed and preserved in a jar of formaldehyde. Her skeleton and a cast of her body placed on display in Paris’ Musée de l’homme.189 Racist and sexist ideologies underlay this inhumane treatment of her, and she was, in effect, a body transformed into sculpture, one that pushed to the extreme the questions of “appropriate” beholder response, sexual arousal, and medical inquiry. I have raised all these examples not to claim their medical accuracy, of course, but rather because I believe they provide a paradigm for the type of analysis to which Canova’s Venus “Images of Sara Bartman: Sexuality, Race, and Gender in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain,” in Nation, Empire, Colony: Historicizing Gender and Race, ed. Ruth Roach Pierson and Nupur Chaudhuri (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1998), 220–236; Gilman, “Black Bodies, White Bodies,” 206; and Sheila Smith McKoy, “Placing and Replacing ‘The Venus Hottentot’: An Archaeology of Pornography, Race, and Power,” in Representation and Black Womanhood: The Legacy of Sarah Baartman, ed. Natasha Gordon-Chipembere (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 91. 188 For the way Baartman’s display reinforced the authority of white men in a moment when that authority was in jeopardy, see Mitchell, “Another Means of Understanding the Gaze,” 33. 189 For a detailed account of the treatment of her body following her death, see Anne Fausto-Sterling, “Gender, Race, and Nation: The Comparative Anatomy of ‘Hottentot’ Women in Europe, 1815–1817,” in Deviant Bodies: Critical Perspectives on Difference in Science and Popular Culture, ed. Jennifer Terry and Jacqueline Urla (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995), 19–48.

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Fig. 3.25: William Heath, A Pair of Broad Bottoms, 1810. Etching, hand-colored, on wove paper, 35 × 25 cm. Courtesy of The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University

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Italica was ultimately subject. During the early nineteenth century, the fluidity of the display, viewing, and analysis of real women and sculpture echoed and was part and parcel of the interconnectedness of “art,” “entertainment,” and “science.” The female body was meant to be seen and to be seen through; its exterior could seduce the senses and its interior could stimulate the mind. Even sculptural “flesh”— whether made of marble or wax—encouraged the (imaginative) dissection of the sculptural body. Canova’s “soft” sculptures, with their yielding flesh and waxed and colored marbled surfaces could therefore be read as “real” bodies, as “real” skin. This enabled viewers like Ducros and Lucchesi Palli to comment not only on the blood coursing beneath the surface of the Canova’s sculpture’s skin, but also to consider the sculpture’s reproductive capabilities. Let us return, then to some of the comments made by viewers of Canova’s Venus. Ducos, after commenting on the veins in her shoulder, then returned to a lengthy discussion of her body, relishing her back, her buttocks, her hips, her thighs—the way she “palpitated with love and pleasure.”190 His delight was transformed by more prosaic minds into the study of her proportions. This reflected the erudite nature of Canova’s viewers, who often were well trained in connoisseurship and therefore felt authorized to pass judgment on whether a sculpture’s proportions were correct. At the same time, it also reflected the way proportions were used as “objective” medical and scientific evidence in the early nineteenth century and the way that information was used by a broad public. For instance, in keeping with the growing interest in phrenology, some viewers commented on the size of Venus’ head in relation to her body. Reviews were mixed. Lady Sydney Morgan thought her head was in relatively good proportion to her 190 Ducos, Itinéraire et souvenirs, vol. 4, 221–222.

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body, so Canova’s Venus was at least spared the accusation of stupidity, unlike the poor “idiot” the Venus de’Medici, who had fallen victim to “the unsparing hands of science.”191 By 1845, Charles Edwards Lester, however, felt her “facial angle […] approaches that of the monkey” and decried the abnormal extreme turn of her head.192 Although Lester himself was an abolitionist, it is impossible to read Lester’s criticism without noting the racial undercurrents. Cuvier, after all, compared Sarah Baartman’s skull to that of a monkey, and Pieter Camper’s analysis of the facial angles and proportions of the face in the 1770s, subsequently (mis)used for generations as “evidence” of racial hierarchies, relied on the comparison of an orangutan skull with the Apollo Belvedere.193 Other authors were more focused on the Venus’ hips and waist. In 1819, Thomas Moore declared her “too long and lanky,” and the poet Leigh Hunt, who lived in Italy from 1822 to 1825, criticized her “straight sides.”194 Jacques Galiffe, the Swiss historian and genealogist, declared “[h]er legs are deficient in delicacy; her waist is not so slender nor her hips so full as perfect beauty would require; but above all, 191 Lady (Sydney) Morgan, Italy, 2 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, 1821), vol. 2, 64. 192 Charles Edwards Lester, The Artist, the Merchant, and the Statesman of the Age of the Medici, and of Our Own Times, 2 vols. (Paine and Burgess, 1845), vol. 2, 201. 193 For Cuvier’s comments on Sarah Baartman, see Sharpley-Whiting, Black Venus, 23–26. For Camper, see David Bindman, Ape to Apollo: Aesthetics and the Idea of Race in the Eighteenth Century (London: Reaktion Books, 2002), 201–209. 194 See the diary entry for Oct. 21, 1819, in Thomas Moore, “Diary of Thomas Moore,” in Memoirs, Journal and Correspondence of Thomas Moore, ed. John Russell, 8 vols. (London: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, 1853), vol. 3, 42; and Leigh Hunt, The Autobiography of Leigh Hunt, with Reminisces of Friends and Contemporaries, 3 vols. (London: Smith, Elder and co, 1850), vol. 3, 132.

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the outline on the right side, descending from the girdle to the knee, is strikingly incorrect.”195 The surgeon John Bell admired the front view of the statue, although admitted it could be “a little rounder.”196 It was her rear, however, to which he most objected: “To my idea, the back represents a tame, flat line, which, together with a slight degree of too great length in the left leg, may be mentioned as injuring this exquisitely beautiful work of art.”197 The physician James Johnson, who traveled through Italy in 1823 and 1829, cited John Bell’s comments in his own journal, adding: Unfortunately, Canova has directed the force of his genius to the POSTERIOR of his goddess— and certainly he has the fair sex themselves on his side—for they are much more inclined to imitate the Hottentot than the Medicean Venus. Canova has given his female a head capable of containing a proper proportion of brain:—Praxiteles must have considered intellect unnecessary, and the Venus di Medicis is acknowledged, according to all phrenological canons, to have been a fool.198

For Johnson, real women’s bodies, it would seem, could never live up to ideal established by the classical statue. Even if the Venus de’Medici was a “fool,” which Canova’s Venus arguably was 195 Jacques Augustin Galiffe, Italy and Its Inhabitants: An Account of a Tour in That Country in 1816 and 1817: Containing a View of Characters, Manners, Customs, Governments, Antiquities, Literature, Dialects, Theatres, and the Fine Arts; with Some Remarks on the Origin of Rome and of the Latin Language, 2 vols. (London: J. Murray, 1820), vol. 2, 390. 196 Bell, Observations on Italy, vol. 1, 57. 197 Ibid., vol. 1, 58. 198 James Johnson, Change of Air, or the Philosophy of Travelling; Being Autumnal Excursions through France, Switzerland, Italy, Germany and Belgium (London: S. Highley and G. Underwood, 1831), 99.

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not, the sculptor’s attention to the statue’s rear likened her too much to the “fair sex.” But the racialized nature of Johnson’s comment did not juxtapose only the ideal and the real. Canova’s emphasis on the Venus Italica’s rounded buttocks threatened to collapse the distinction between “white” and “black,” “European” and “other.” Analysis of the Venus’ torso, therefore, was not limited to aesthetic criticism. Towards the middle of the century, in a surprising rhetorical shift, viewers began to ponder her reproductive capabilities. Here, too, however, there was no consensus. James Wilson, who in 1820 also admired “great softness in the flesh, grace in the attitude, and loveliness in the face,” nonetheless felt “the figure is disproportionately tall, the hips are too narrow, and the head is too long.”199 Moreover, he suggested her narrow hips would lead to tragedy. “With respect to the breadth of the hips,” he wrote, “it is the grand defect of all his female statues, that every one of them would die in child-bed.”200 A conflicting evaluation even found its way into an anthropological study. In a review of René Cailliè’s 1830 Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, the author suggested that obesity acted as a form of natural birth control. Perhaps, he argued, “the Moor’s” tradition of encouraging weight gain in young women was an attempt to limit the number of pregnancies. Canova’s Venus, on the other hand, was used to exemplify those “long-sided women” who were “exceedingly prolific.”201 By the time a copy of Canova’s statue was exhibited 199 James Wilson, A Journal of Two Successive Tours upon the Continent, in the Years 1816, 1817, & 1818, 3 vols. (London: T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1820), vol. 1, 392. 200 Ibid., vol. 1, 392–393. 201 Sylvanus Urban [Edward van Cave], ed., “Review.— Foreign Quarterly Review, no. XI,” The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle, from July to Dec. 1830. Vol. C. Being Part of a New Series, Part the Second (Aug. 1830): 143–144.

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at the 1862 international exhibition, criticism had shifted again. One reviewer wrote that the Venus Italica was “so unwomanly in form, that were she endowed with life, she could never bring forth a child; her pelvic development is insufficient.”202 The play between concealment and revelation enacted by the Venus Italica’s clutched drapery therefore mimicked and modernized the pudica pose favored by artists and anatomists; she promised the viewer a peep show that provided a different type of access to her body.203 Sex was the special province of Venus, yet the Venus Italica took sexual preoccupation in an altogether different direction. The combination of her form, her own sexual awareness, her soft surface, her display conditions, and the history of the female anatomy brought her into a discourse of “the real” where the real was determined by contemporary medical norms. Although she was not pregnant, her reproductive potential—or lack thereof—was inherent to her status as a woman. In this sense, she mimicked the Anatomical Venus in La Specola. Francesco de Ceglia has argued that the Anatomical Venus in La Specola was “a not-pregnant woman in whose womb a foetus has been inserted.”204 Like her, Canova’s Venus was also a morphological anomaly. She too was a non-pregnant woman 202 John Gardner, “Sculpture in the International Exhibition,” in Examples of the Architecture of the Victorian Age, and Monthly Review of the World’s Architectural Progress (London: Darton and Hodge, 1862), vol. 1, 119. The copy of the Venus Italica exhibited at the International Exhibition and attributed to G. M. Benzoni is currently in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. 203 For the play on revealing and concealing, see Simons, “Anatomical Secrets,” 302–327, and Ludmilla Jordanova, Sexual Visions: Images of Gender in Science and Medicine between the Eighteenth and Twentieth Centuries (New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1989), chapter 5, “Nature Unveiling before Science,” 87–110. 204 de Ceglia, “Rotten Corpses,” 441.

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in whom a fetus could be imagined. And like the Anatomical Venus, Canova’s Venus too could be dissected, even if only in the viewer’s mind. This engagement with contemporary medical discourse was also accompanied by and affected moral imperatives regarding reproduction. The link between childbirth and morality was not new, of course. Throughout history women’s capacity to bear children has been both a punishment and a mark of virtue, although which category a given pregnancy fell into largely depended on the manner of conception and whether it was sanctioned by the marriage bed. By the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, feminine virtue could be determined not just by a woman’s behavior, but by her very anatomy. The obsessive interest in the Venus Italica’s hip measurements and whether she was too fat or too slim were part of a broader European preoccupation with whether women were morally and biologically fit to reproduce.205 This had racial imperatives as well. The comparison between Canova’s Venus and African women in the anthropological review I cited earlier, for instance, reflects anxiety about the supposed fecundity of Black women. This stereotype was rooted in Black women’s supposed lack of modesty and their sexual proclivities as well as the “scientific” analysis of Black women’s bodies, including their supposedly ample buttocks.206 205 Sarah Toulalan, “‘Unfit for Generation’: Body Size and Reproduction,” in Secrets of Generation: Reproduction in the Long Eighteenth Century, ed. Raymond Stephanson and Darren N. Wagner (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015), 299–318. 206 For the stereotype of the fecundity of Black women, see Curran, The Anatomy of Blackness, 112–113. Londa Schiebinger has pointed out how steatopygia and pelvic size were implicated in the establishment of racial hierarchies. See Londa Schiebinger, Nature’s Body: Gender in the Making of Modern Science (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2004), 154–160, and Gilman, “Black Bodies, White Bodies,” 216–219. For a recent

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Moreover, as anatomists learned more about the process of procreation, reproduction was divorced from female pleasure and attitudes towards women’s enjoyment of sex changed. While it had once been believed that women needed to orgasm to conceive, the realization that women could become pregnant even if they did not do so meant that women’s sexual gratification was no longer viewed as fundamental to reproduction.207 The female orgasm was thus deemed unnecessary and increasingly suspect, further reinforcing the idolatry of “modesty.” This negation of female pleasure not only reflected the idealization of motherhood that was common to the period, but it also reiterated the physiological differences between men and women.208 Maternity and motherhood were increasingly presented as “truths” that could be located in the structure of the body itself.209 But this biological determinism had a dark side, for scientific evidence became a way of key way of articulating and justifying

study on the association of Black women with fatness, see Sabrina Strings, Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia (New York: New York University Press, 2019), esp. chapter 3, “The Rise of the Big Black Woman,” 67–98. 207 See Angus McLaren, “The Pleasures of Procreation: Traditional and Biomedical Theories of Conception,” in William Hunter and the Eighteenth-Century Medical World, ed. W. F. Bynum and Roy Porter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 323–341. 208 Schiebinger, Nature’s Body, 159. 209 For the role the anatomical Venuses played in this process, see Elizabeth Stephens, Anatomy as Spectacle: Public Exhibitions of the Body from 1700 to the Present (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2011), 46. Londa Schiebinger has also argued that “the focus on pelvis size served to naturalize women’s role as mother.” See Londa Schiebinger, The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modern Science (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), 209.

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the different treatment of the sexes, and, of course, the races.210 Discussion of morbidezza was therefore transformed in the writings of nineteenth-century beholders of Canova’s Venus from a term that spoke to illusionistic success and desire to one that characterized the goddess in medical terms. She was no longer a divinity, but a penetrable, dissectible body. This shift not only indicated a changing understanding of sculptural theory, but rather was part of a broader struggle about sexual difference, erotic pleasure, and knowledge. To understand Canova’s Venus solely within the confines of a binary relationship with its antique model, or even in relationship to Baroque artistry, therefore, is to disregard the fact that the sculpture existed within an expanded field of representations of women’s bodies. In reducing Canova’s Venus to her reproductive capabilities, male commentators—and in this case, they were predominantly male—used medical discourse as a form of power. The ability to “see through” the sculptural body effectively wrested knowledge about sexual pleasure and anatomy from women—women who were, in effect, only privy to the exterior of their own bodies as the number of midwives decreased and were replaced by male obstetricians—and placed it in the hands of men.211 At the same time, the clinical gaze reaff irmed the idea that a woman’s value, and indeed, perhaps even her beauty, lay in her reproductive potential. Finally, and perhaps more importantly, medical discourse allowed men to transform what might otherwise be an arousing vision of the female nude into a scientific exercise. The seductive, deceptive surface of the marble 210 Schiebinger, Nature’s Body, chapter 5, “Theories of Gender and Race,” 143–183. 211 See Schiebinger, Nature’s Body, chapter 4, “The Anatomy of Difference,” 115–142, and Schiebinger, The Mind Has No Sex?, 104–112 and 266–268.

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could be dismissed in favor of the sculpture’s quantifiable anatomical interior. Yet her soft flesh, her hips, thighs, and buttocks, even her reproductive organs were still theirs to enjoy under the sanitizing umbrella of science. Sensual pleasure was mitigated by medical analysis; in the nineteenth century, Venus went under the knife.

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4. Challenging the Supremacy of Painting Abstract: Chapter four, “Challenging the Supremacy of Painting,” focuses on the 1817 exhibition of Canova’s Polinnia in the newly opened public painting gallery of the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice. The new director, Leopoldo Cicognara, exhibited Canova’s Polinnia with recently restored Venetian Old Master paintings, including Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin. In the confrontation between these two Venetian masters who both excelled at the depiction of flesh, Cicognara constructed a clear, understandable narrative for a diverse audience that merged politics and aesthetics. He literally enacted the paragone, or competition between painting and sculpture, to reaffirm the Veneto’s artistic authority in a moment of political decline. Keywords: Academy of Fine Arts in Venice, Titian, paragone, Venice, Assumption of the Virgin, Polyhymnia

As we have seen, the significance of Canova’s sculptures was regularly established through comparisons with other well-known works of art. The juxtapositions between Triumphant Perseus and the Apollo Belvedere, and the Venus Italica and the Venus de’Medici are just two of the best-known examples. While Canova’s work was frequently aligned with or contrasted to ancient sculpture, associations with more modern works of art were also equally important. In Venice, for instance, in honor of the inauguration of the painting galleries of the Accademia di Belle Arti (Academy of Fine Arts) in 1817, Canova’s Polinnia stood in the grand salon of the Accademia, surrounded by some of the greatest Venetian paintings of all time. His sculpture and Titian’s recently restored Assumption of the Virgin (1516–1518) were the highlights of the show. Canova and Titian were both hailed for their ability to depict flesh, but

it was not just the handling of material that linked the two artists. By creating a direct link between the Old Masters, their past triumphs, and the present ascendancy of the arts under Canova, the exhibition vaunted the constancy and continued excellence of the Veneto’s artistic tradition in contradistinction to its changing political fortunes. Positioning Canova’s Polinnia in a room full of Venetian paintings also elicited critical issues regarding the language of art by raising the specter of the paragone, the contest between painting and sculpture.

Canova and the Veneto Although Canova spent the greater portion of his adult life in Rome, he retained a connection to the Veneto, the region of his birth which played an important role in shaping the

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_ch04

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sculptor’s artistic sensibilities.1 Private patronage and public commissions reinforced this link. Canova’s repeated requests to position his Venus Italica with other Venetian masterpieces in the Uffizi attest to his fervent nationalism. Throughout his life, his letters to his friends convey a continual longing for his homeland. Venetians likewise emphasized Canova’s connection to the region, a cultural association intended to counterbalance the state’s political diff iculties. The fall of the Republic in 1797, after centuries of oligarchic rule, devastated the political stability, power, and economy of the Veneto, not to mention the confidence and self-assurance of its inhabitants. As with many other Italian states, during the twenty years that followed its fall, the Republic’s changing fortunes were complex. Believing it would be granted independence, Venice surrendered peacefully to the French on May 12, 1797, but the Venetian territories were quickly ceded to the Austrians as part of the Treaty of Campo Formio.2 In 1805, French troops regained the city. Austrians off icially lost control of the territory through the Peace of Pressburg, signed on December 26, 1805, and Venice was subsequently absorbed into the Regno Italico. When the French were finally defeated in 1815, the Venetian territories reverted to Austrian jurisdiction until 1866, when the Veneto joined the newly unified Kingdom of Italy. Although scholars now have a more tempered view of the Hapsburg empire and its authority over the Veneto, contemporary views vacillated between enthusiastic support for the Austrian 1 See Giandomenico Romanelli, “Antonio Canova,” in The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century, ed. Jane Martineau and Andrew Robinson (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1994), 407–421. 2 Piero del Negro, “Venezia e la terraferma nel 1796–1797,” in Bonaparte a Verona, ed. Gian Paolo Marchi and Paola Marini (Venice: Marsilio, 1997), 34–38.

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state and wholehearted condemnation.3 Censorship and repression were thought to have stifled the political and creative spirit of the Venetians. Despite modern successes in the theater, opera, and salons, it was generally understood that fine arts in Venice—indeed in all of Italy—had been in decline since the sixteenth century. As the eighteenth century waned, the absence of great modern painters—and the “the total absence, more or less, of all contemporary talent in sculpture”—created a cultural void waiting to be filled.4 Canova stepped in, with power and grace that was deemed predestined. Modern sculpture thus displaced modern painting in importance. In 1816, comparing the state of art in Italy to that in other European countries, Pietro Giordani revered the artist. “Sculpture is singularly ours,” he wrote, for the “heavens gave us a Canova.”5 Although various states in Italy declared Canova was uniquely “theirs,” none laid more claim to him than Venice. Venetians heralded the painters of the past, yet given the absence of great contemporary painters, they sought the continuity of their artistic lineage elsewhere. The fact that many of the greatest Old Master painters had come from the Veneto, which could now claim to be the birthplace of the greatest sculptor, cemented Venice’s artistic legacy and united painting and sculpture in the eyes of the Venetians. In the absence of political stability and power, the f ine arts took on the role of cultural stabilizer; by uniting past and present 3 David Laven, Venice and Venetia under the Habsburgs, 1815–1835 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). 4 Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages; ou, mémoires historiques sur la vie et les travaux de célèbre artiste (Paris: A. Le Clere, 1834), 10–11. 5 Pietro Giordani, “‘Storia della scultura dal suo risorgimento in Italia’. Articolo primo,” Biblioteca italiana, o sia giornale di letteratura, scienze ed arti compilato da varj letterati III (July–Sept. 1816): 235–236.

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successes in the arts, Venetians attempted to establish cultural supremacy in the face of their political oppression. Out of the political tumult emerged an artist who more than any other reminded Venetians of their very “Venetianness.” It seems almost inevitable then, that Canova should have been linked in the cultural imagination with the Veneto’s other great master, Titian.

Uniting Canova and Titian Canova was himself a great admirer of Titian; early in his career, he even attempted to paint in the Old Master’s style.6 The two artists were first united in the public imagination because of Girolamo Zulian’s and Angelo Querini’s plans to erect a monument to Titian in 1790.7 The absence of a monument to celebrate the Veneto’s greatest painter had long been considered a travesty. Canova was selected to design a monument to be erected in Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, over the supposed site of Titian’s grave. The sculptor made several bozzetti for the work and plans were underway for construction, however, the death of Zulian in 1795, followed shortly by the fall of the Republic, shelved plans for the monument (Fig. 4.1). One bozzetto remained visible in the studio of Canova’s friend, the architect Giannantonio Selva, until his death in 1819, and in 1821 in his guidebook Otto giorni a Venezia, Antonio Quadri described seeing models (now lost) for the work in the Galleria dell’Accademia.8 6 Gian Lorenzo Mellini, “Uno dei primi dipinti di Antonio Canova,” Antichità viva 34.4 (1995): 48–50. 7 Zygmunt Waźbiński, “Tiziano Vecellio e la ‘tragedia della sepoltura’,” in Tiziano e Venezia: Convegno internazionale di studi, Venezia, 1976 (Vicenza: N. Pozza, 1980), 255–273. 8 For the models in the Galleria dell’Accademia, see Antonio Quadri, Otto giorni a Venezia. Opera di Antonio Quadri I.R. segretario del cesareo regio governo

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Quadri’s attention to the monument in 1821 signals the importance it retained for the Venetian population, who came to associate the unusual pyramidal shape and iconographic details—such as the weeping lions, an allusion to Saint Mark, and the allegorical figures of the “sister arts,” sculpture and architecture, who follow the veiled, pained figure of painting into the tomb—with its very Venetianness.9 The association between these figures and Venice continued even when the overall design was reused to create the mausoleum of MariaCristina of Austria in the Augustinerkirche in Vienna (1798–1805), and, later, Canova’s own tomb, erected in the Frari (Fig. 4.2). The easily identifiable, yet transferable and transformable nature of Canova’s pyramidal structure linked the names of Canova and Titian in the public’s imagination for years. Even as late as 1860, Erastus Benedict, an American lawyer and politician, remembered the monument’s early history. He elided Titian and Canova in a dizzying account of his visit to the Augustinerkirche in Vienna, which is worth quoting at length: In the church of the Augustines is Canova’s masterpiece of monumental composition—the tomb of the Archduchess Christina, of Saxr Teschen, the favorite daughter of Maria Theresa. It is the same idea as the monument to Canova, in the Church of the Frati at Venice, which I mentioned in a letter from that city. The design of Canova—his great genius, is here. The original design is said to have been intended by the great sculptor for Titian. How eminently e socio corrispondente del Veneto Ateneo, 2 vols. (Venice: Francesco Andreola, 1821–1822), vol. 1, 154. 9 Leopoldo Cicognara, “Elogio di Tiziano Vecellio,” in Discorsi letti nella R. Veneta Accademia di Belle Arti per la distribuzione de’ premii li XIII. Agosto MDCCCIX (Venice: Picotti, 1809), 34, note 2.

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Fig. 4.1: Antonio Canova, Model for the Monument to Titian, ca. 1790–1795. Terracotta, 70 × 69 × 20.5 cm. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy

fit—what a laudable and modest monumental self-glorification it was for Canova to tax his wonderful powers in a monument for Titian—a monument of his own genius in honor of Titian’s glory. But failing—I do not know why—to devote it to Titian, and having first applied it

for the Archduchess, it was exceedingly appropriate that, after his own death it should be produced in the best style then possible, for his own monument, in the same church where he had designed to place it for Titian. It is now there, and none the less a monument to Titian

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Fig. 4.2: Giuseppe Borsato, Leopoldo Cicognara, President of the Accademia in Venice, Showing the Canova Tomb in S. Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, ca. 1827. Oil on canvas, 80 × 61 cm. Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris, France. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY

by Canova, although in the same church is another monument to Titian, and this is called a monument to Canova. So here, in Vienna, it is really another monument to Titian and to Canova, for the memory can never be lost that the design was for Titian by Canova, and when the Archduchess shall have passed away from memory, except as she shall be preserved by this monument— when a heap of dust alone remains of her, a blaze of glory will shine around the memory of Canova and Titian, and their names will be as fresh as to-day.10

The Titian monument, therefore, was the starting point for a series of monuments that 10 Erastus C. Benedict, A Run through Europe (New York: D. Appleton, 1860), 319–230.

linked the name of the great painter with the great sculptor—a connection that was fueled by their constant pairing by Leopoldo Cicognara, director of the Accademia from 1808 to 1826 (Fig. 4.3). In Cicognara’s annual discourses to the students of the Accademia, Canova was a continual reference, an inspiration upon whom the young artists were to model themselves. In the Elogio di Tiziano Vecellio, read in front of the eager class of 1809 and published that same year, for instance, Cicognara resurrects the idea of creating a monument to Titian, which had been suspended but which “remained in the mind of the one who alone could emulate the valor of Titian with his chisel.”11 Although Canova goes unnamed in the speech itself—for Cicognara knew the sculptor would be identified easily 11 Cicognara, “Elogio di Tiziano Vecellio,” 10.

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Fig. 4.3: Ludovico Lipparini, Portrait of Leopoldo Cicognara with Canova’s Beatrice, 1825. Oil in canvas, 193 × 118 cm. Ca’ Pesaro – Galleria Internazionale d’Arte Moderna, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY

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by his listeners—in the footnotes to the printed text, Cicognara explicitly linked the two artists by forcefully reasserting his wish to complete the Titian monument.12 “Titian deserves to be sculpted only by a Canova,” he wrote. Not only was Canova worthy of the commission because of his privileged position as the regenerator of sculpture, but equally important was the fact that he, like Titian, was Venetian. This compatriotism was divine providence, for “it seems that nature, zealous for the glory of the Venetian soil, wanted to reserve the advantage of erecting a monument [to Titian] to a son from the same mother, pleasing itself in this way to pass to posterity these two linked names, who shared the same country and that which is more, their shared excellence in their respective arts.”13 Plans were also made to engrave the monument, to celebrate a work that was explicitly “a double monument to the perfection of the fine arts.”14 The representation, then, of an allegorical figure of painting mourning its loss, in sculptural form, brought together the two arts in which Venice excelled. The national fervor of Cicognara’s text was not lost on its readers, who included Canova. The sculptor praised Cicognara on a text “written with great spirit and national love for Venice.”15 Cicognara’s fondness for Venetian art was unusual given that he was not Venetian himself. Born in Ferrara in 1767, he moved to Venice in 1807 and undertook the position of director of the Accademia di Belle Arti in April 1808.16 In his inaugural speech of 1808 he acknowledged the unusual nature of his attachment to Venice 12 Ibid., 32, note 2. 13 Ibid., 33, note 2. 14 Ibid., 36, note 2. 15 Cited in Vittorio Malamani, Un’amicizia di Antonio Canova. Lettere di lui al conte Leopoldo Cicognara (Città di Castello: S. Lapi Tipografo-Editore, 1890), 4. 16 Caterina Ferri, “Leopoldo Cicognara e la formazione delle gallerie dell’Accademia di Venezia,” Venezia Arti 8 (1994): 85–88.

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even as he celebrated the region’s cultural prowess. He praised the long-standing tradition of Venetian patronage, tracing it to the Republic’s origins in the eleventh century. He admired the Republic’s Renaissance painters. And, of course, he celebrated the founding of the Accademia in the eighteenth century. Venetian artists were praised, but it was Canova who was singled out, both as the greatest sculptor of the Veneto and as the greatest sculptor of Italy itself, surpassing even Donatello, Michelangelo, Cellini, and Giambologna.17

Promoting Contemporary Venetian Art When Venice was once again handed over to the Austrians in 1815 Cicognara may have paid homage to a different sovereign in his speeches at the Accademia, but his dedication to Venetian art remained the same. Yet, despite his insis­ tence on the strength of Venice’s artistic legacy during this political turmoil, the changes in government did affect the status of the f ine arts. The Accademia found itself in financial straits, and its students with fewer and fewer patrons. James Sloan, an American traveler who found himself in Venice in 1816, felt that the new political rulers were stifling the arts within the city. The Austrians showed no interest in commissioning new works of art, and the city’s churches and palazzi were already bursting with masterpieces—turning a legacy that was meant to be inspirational into one through which art 17 Leopoldo Cicognara, “Discorso del sig. cavaliere Leopoldo Cicognara presidente della R. Accademia, sull’origine delle accademie,” in Discorsi letti in occasione della pubblica aperture tenuta dalla R. Veneta Accademia di Belle Arti essendosi per la prima volta solennemente distribuiti i premj alle rispettive classi de’ giovani alunni in presenza della primarie autorità residenti in questa comune (Venice: Picotti, 1808), 23.

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students were “doomed to be crushed by the rough hand of adversity.”18 Recent scholarship has revised this belief that the Austrians had no interest in promoting the fine arts in Venice, and in fact has shown how the imperial government utilized Venetian art to unite their vast empire.19 Cicognara too proved to be a great tactician who was willing to work with the Austrians in order to achieve his goals.20 For example, he seized the marriage of Francis I of Austria to Princess Carolina Augusta of Bavaria as an opportunity to honor the bride and groom, ingratiate himself with the current government, and redress the city’s diminished patronage. The provinces were required to present a gift on their behalf.21 According to Cicognara, the Lombardy region had allotted 30,000 zecchini (about US$1,233,000 today) to celebrate the wedding, and “the Venetian section

will give what it can.”22 A large sum would strain the Veneto’s already beleaguered finances, but Cicognara found a solution that would redirect at least some of those expenses back to the Venetians themselves.23 He convinced Count Peter von Goëss, governor of Venice, to use 10,000 zecchini (about US$411,000 today) to commission “many works of painting and sculpture, all Venetian,” as a gift for the royal couple.24 Young Venetian artists would have a chance to showcase their skills, for their works of art would be exhibited in 1818 in the newly restored Gallerie dell’Accademia. The resulting exhibition, L’omaggio delle Provincie Venete alla maestà di Carolina Augusta, Imperatrice d’Austria, would be accompanied by a luxurious volume of engravings, and works could be admired by the Venetian public before being sent to decorate the royal apartment of the emperor in Vienna.25 As the pièce de résistance, Cicognara was able

18 James Sloan and Theodore Lyman, Rambles in Italy; in the Years 1816 … 17 (Baltimore, MD: N. G. Maxwell J. Robinson, 1818), 176. 19 See David Laven, “Introduction: Titian, Canova, and the Frari in the Nineteenth Century,” in Canova, Tiziano e la basilica dei Frari a Venezia nell’Ottocento = Canova, Titian, and the Church of the Frari in Venice in the 19th Century, ed. Elena Catra, Isabella Collavizza, and Vittorio Pajusco (Treviso: ZeL Edizioni, 2017), 10; and Elena Catra, “Il cenotafio ad Antonio Canova (1822–1827) e il monumento a Tiziano Vecellio (1839–1852),” in ibid., esp. 32–42. 20 See Eva-Maria Baumgartner, “Leopoldo Cicognara e la tutela del patrimonio artistico veneziano,” Ateneo veneto, 3rd Ser., 12.1 (2013): 413–422; and Roberta Battaglia and Anna Pizzati, “Leopoldo Cicognara: Il dialogo con i governatori austriaci per la tutela del patrimonio artistico,” in Canova, Hayez, Cicognara: L’ultima gloria di Venezia, ed. Fernando Mazzocca, Paola Marini, and Roberto de Feo (Venice: Marsilio, 2017), 96–115. 21 Fernando Mazzocca, “La Ricomparsa di Polimnia: Creazione e vicende di un capolavoro di Antonio Canova,” Per Giuseppe Mazzariol, ed. Manlio Brusatin and Wladimiro Dorigo (Rome: Viella, 1992), 171.

22 Some of the correspondence between Cicognara and Canova is published in Paolo Mariuz, “‘L’omaggio delle provincie venete’ nelle lettere di Leopoldo Cicognara e Antonio Canova,” Canova e l’Accademia: Il maestro e gli allievi, ed. Fabrizio Magani and Paolo Mariuz (Treviso: Canova, 2002), 13–18. For the full text of the letters, see Antonio Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), ed. Hugh Honour and Paolo Mariuz, 2 vols. (Rome: Salerno, 2002) vol. 2, 612. I am grateful to Matthew Boylan, Senior Research Librarian at the New York Public Library, for helping me determine the value of zecchini in today’s dollars. 23 Mazzocca, “La ricomparsa di Polimnia,” 171. 24 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 612. 25 For more on the exhibition, see the 1818 catalogue Omaggio delle Provincie Venete alla maestà di Carolina Augusta, Imperatrice d’Austria, reprinted in Magani and Mariuz, eds., Canova e l’Accademia: Il maestro e gli allievi, 39–74, as well as the essays in that volume. More recently, see Roberto de Feo, “L’omaggio delle provincie venete alla maestà di Carolina Augusta imperatrice d’Austria: Un glorioso capitolo dell’arte e della storia veneziana,” in Canova, Hayez, Cicognara: L’ultima gloria di Venezia, ed. Fernando Mazzocca, Paola Marini, and Roberto de Feo (Venice: Marsilio, 2017), 38–69.

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to convince Canova to contribute his recently completed sculpture, Polinnia, “object of the highest rank and most worthy of the Royal Cabinet”26 (Fig. 4.4). Over and over in the history of Italian art, cities, kingdoms or communal governments sponsored works that spurred patriotic fervor or subtly reasserted native identity while under foreign domination. But Cicognara’s approach was distinctly modern, for he made these assertions in the context of a museum exhibition. From a personal point of view, it cemented Cicognara’s position as a leader on the cultural front and in the emerging discipline of art criticism and scholarship. More broadly, the exhibition provided an economic stimulus while also furthering the role of the arts as cultural guarantor of national identity. Canova’s Polinnia, unlike the other works in the show, was not commissioned specifically for the exhibition. The development of the sculpture has a long history. Elisa Bonaparte Bacciochi, Napoleon’s sister and grand duchess of Tuscany, commissioned a portrait of herself as the muse Concordia, to complement Canova’s sculpture of their mother, Letizia Ramolino Bonaparte (Madame Mère). However, Marie Louise, the new, young wife of Napoleon, decided that she herself wanted to be depicted in the garb of Concordia and Canova completed the marble accordingly.27 During Canova’s two stays in Florence, in 1810 and 1812, however, Elisa commissioned yet another work from him. Duplicating the seated position of the earlier two works, this piece depicted Elisa in the guise of Polinnia, the muse of sacred poetry and hymn (Fig. 4.5). The

fall of Napoleon in 1814, Elisa’s dismissal from the throne, and her inability to finance the project brought an end to the commission.28 Canova subsequently modified the facial features of the work, transformed the face into an ideal type, and promised the work to Count Cesare Bianchetti, a prominent Bolognese collector. Cicognara did not let the fact that the work had been promised to another patron stop him from imagining Polinnia as the highlight of the show. He coaxed Canova into speaking with Count Bianchetti, revealing not only the strength of Canova’s attachment to the Accademia, but also that of his friendship with Cicognara. In his letters to the sculptor, Cicognara played on Canova’s vanity and national sentiment, arguing that the Venetian section would be nothing without his sculpture.29 Bianchetti f inally agreed to renounce the work, albeit begrudgingly. That “schemer” Cicognara had forced his hand.30 In a letter to Canova, the count lamented Cicognara’s meddling, but he ultimately capitulated: “You can imagine what I wrote: How can one say no to you?”31 Despite Bianchetti’s frustration, the sculpture arrived in Venice on July 29, 1817, well in time for the Omaggio exhibition planned for the spring of 1818.32 Although the Omaggio exhibition would not officially open until May 24, 1818, Cicognara did not let Canova’s sculpture languish in obscurity after its arrival in Venice. During the ten-month period between the sculpture’s arrival and the opening of the Omaggio exhibition, Polinnia was

26 Leopoldo Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua rappresentante la musa Polinnia scolpita dal m. Antonio Canova (Venice: Picotti, 1817), 5. 27 For the sculpture of Maria Luisa Habsburg as Concordia, see Mario Praz and Giuseppe Pavanello, L’opera completa del Canova (Milan: Rizzoli, 1976), 121, nos. 226–229.

28 Mazzocca, “La ricomparsa di Polimnia,” 172. 29 See Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 611–612. 30 Ibid., vol. 2, 648. 31 Ibid. 32 Ibid., vol. 2, 890 and 933–934, respectively. Canova shipped the sculpture on July 9, 1817, and Cicognara received it on the 29th of the same month.

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Fig. 4.4: Antonio Canova, Polinnia, 1817. Marble, 152 × 127 × 72 cm. Hofburg Imperial Palace, Vienna, Austria. © Mark E. Smith / Scala / Art Resource, NY

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Fig. 4.5: Antonio Canova, Bozzetto for Elisa Baciocchi Bonaparte as the Muse Polinnia. Terracotta, 26.8 × 11.5 × 20.5 cm. Private Collection, Turin, Italy

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on view in the Accademia.33 It was unveiled with great fanfare in an exhibition held for two weeks in August 1817, during the annual distribution of prizes to the Accademia’s students. It was a unique prize ceremony because it coincided (intentionally) with the opening of the Accademia’s new Pinacoteca, or painting gallery. The 1817 exhibition celebrated the inauguration of the painting gallery by exhibiting Canova’s sculpture in the company of the finest Venetian Old Master paintings. It seems fitting, then, that although the sculpture was not commissioned specifically for the show, Cicognara reinterpreted Polinnia’s significance, declaring her to be the muse of memory and history.34 The entire premise of the exhibit was rooted in political, institutional, and artistic memory, recalling the pinnacle of Venetian cultural and political power through repeated and multivalent references to the past.

Celebrating Venice’s Cultural Patrimony The opening of the new painting galleries of the Accademia owed itself, at least in part, to the French and their wholesale spoliation of the city. Although the Accademia had been founded in 1750 as a teaching institution for the fine arts, the idea for a museum did not emerge until 1807. It too was intended for didactic purposes and, that same year, the Accademia was relocated to a series of buildings with ample space for a new museum. These included the convent of the 33 Giulio Manieri Elia, “‘Un salone immenso di grandissime opere antiche di pennello’: La sala delle pubbliche funzioni e il suo primo assetto espositivo,” in Canova, Hayez, Cicognara: L’ultima gloria di Venezia, ed. Fernando Mazzocca, Paola Marini, and Roberto de Feo (Venice: Marsilio, 2017), 84–95. 34 Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua, 7–8.

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Lateran Canons, designed by Palladio in 1561, the Chiesa della Carità, and the Scuola della Carità, all of which had been part of the numerous religious orders and public buildings that had been suppressed during the French occupation.35 Over the course of the next decade, these buildings underwent significant renovation to suit their new purpose as exhibition spaces. Giannantonio Selva was partially responsible for the creation of the galleries, including two grand salons on the upper floor, and five rooms on the lower floor.36 The architect was aware of the importance of these rooms. In a letter to Cicognara, on March 26, 1817, in which Selva included a drawing for two new rooms to be added to the painting galleries, he commented on the museum’s expansion. Selva recognized that in their original “humid and obscure” ecclesiastical locations many paintings had suffered. Their inclusion in the new galleries would protect them. Moreover, he understood the museum would soon become “one of the nation’s, and monarchy’s, most beautiful and most rich collections.”37 This was a project 35 Giovanna Nepi Sciré, Accademia Galleries in Venice (Milano: Electa, 2009), 8. 36 Ibid., 9–13. 37 Letter from Giannantonio Selva to Cicognara, March 26, 1817, in Busta 1817, Archivio dell’Accademia di Belle Arti, Venezia. “Ho l’onore, Sig. Cav. Presidente, di rassegnarle il nuovo disegno da Lei commessomi, delle due eguali sale per la Pinacoteca che dalla Sovrana Munificenza si vuole aggiungere a questa R. Accademia, capace di contenere, non solo i quadri che ora possede l’Accademia medesima, ma anche i migliori (che non pochi) fra quelli che si custodiscono nel locale della fu Commenda di Malta. Nel prendere di mira quest’ oggetto contemplato nel Dispaccio dell’ Eccelso Governo ho creduto che abbiasi ad aver presente anche il ritorno di molti preziosi quadri che dalla Francia sono passata per Sovrana Munificenza ad arricchire la Pinacoteca Veneziana; che no debbasi innoltre obbliare quanti se ne sono dovuti raccogliere già minaccianti l’ultimo deperimento, situati in Chiese umide ed oscure; e in

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intended for the community at large, which would benefit all Venetians. The Accademia emerged if not stronger, then relatively unscathed from the recent political disturbances, but it did so at least in part at the expense of other institutions throughout the city. The suppression of religious orders went hand in hand with the despoliation of churches and monasteries and the desacralization of countless objects. Some of these, including eighteen canonical paintings seized because of a secret clause in the Treaty of Campo Formio, were taken to the Louvre in 1797; others were brought to Milan once Venice was annexed to the Regno Italico in 1806.38 Still more works remained in Venice itself, placed in storage in the Basilica dei Santi Giovanni e Paolo. In 1815, after the fall of Napoleon, some works sent to Paris and Milan were returned to Venice. A handful of these were returned to their original churches; the rest were absorbed into the state’s collection or placed in storage. Leopoldo Cicognara and a special committee then devised a system that triaged the works of art remaining in Venice according to a hierarchical system. Paintings were divided into three categories, works that would be put up for sale, those that would be returned to the religious institutions and orders, and “ancient” works to be kept for the Accademia itself.39 Afraid f ine ricordandole di quanti oggetti d’arte curiosi e meritevoli di riguardo abbia aumentato la suppellettile accademica l’ultima disposizione testamentaria del N.H. Ascanio Molin. Per le quali accumulate ragioni non solo rendesi giustif icato, ma si riconosce indispensabile l’ingrandimento del locale destinato a raccogliersi questo prezioso complesso che formerà uno dei più belli e più ricchi depositi della Nazione, e della Monarchia.” 38 For more on the closure of the religious orders and the dispersion of those paintings, see Alvise Zorzi, Venezia scomparsa, 2nd ed. (Milan: Electra, 1984). 39 Anna Maria Spiazzi, “Dipinti demaniali di Venezia e del veneto nella prima metà del secolo XIX: Vicende e

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that some of the most valuable works would be sold off, Cicognara sent waves of petitions to the government requesting works of art for public exhibition, to great success.40 In 1816 the Accademia formally received 250 paintings that would make up the core of the collection. 41 As a result, what was a loss for the religious orders became a boon for the gallery, as many works of art entered the Accademia’s collection after the suppression of those very same churches, monasteries, and convents. But this systematic reorganization of works of art and the categories which Cicognara devised also speak to a new hierarchy of location. No longer were sacred spaces the privileged setting for great works of art. The best objects were allied to the institution of the museum and appreciated for their aesthetic successes rather than for their religious significance. On August 10, 1817, the painting gallery was opened formally to the public. This short, two-week exhibition celebrated “the restoration” of the arts in Venice on multiple levels, as manifested in Cicognara’s repeated use of the words “preserve” (preservare), “reclaimed” (rivendicati), “resurgence” (risorte), and “arise” (sorgere) in his introductory speech. 42 On a fundamental level, the exhibition celebrated recuperi,” Bollettino d’arte del Ministero della Pubblica Istruzione 68, 6. Ser. 20 (1983): 74. 40 Elizabeth Jane Darrow, “Pietro Edwards and the Restoration of the Public Pictures of Venice, 1778–1819: Necessity Introduced These Arts” (PhD diss., University of Washington, 2000), 254. 41 Darrow, “Pietro Edwards,” 258. 42 See Leopoldo Cicognara, “Prolusione del conte Cicognara presidente dell’Accademia [1817],” in Discorsi letti nella grande aula dell’ I.R. Accademia di belle arti in occasione della solenne apertura di una delle sua nuove gallerie, e della pubblica distribuzione dei premii fattasi da S.E. il signor conte di Göess governatore di Venezia, nel dì 10 Agosto 1817 (Venice: Picotti, 1817), 7, 8, 11, and 13 respectively.

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the restoration of celebrated works of art to the Venetian public through the opening of the gallery itself. Since many paintings had been removed from their ecclesiastical locations and had not been visible to the public for years, their display not only symbolically returned them to the people, but their repositioning in the museum also literally constituted and created a new public domain. In addition, many of the great masterpieces that had been seized by the French were returned from their twenty-year sojourn in Paris and restored to their rightful owner. Finally, numerous works of art that had been given to the Accademia were restored to their former glory through careful cleaning and conservation. Pride of place was given to six works of art that had been removed by the French as part of the original eighteen paintings seized in 1797 and whose fame had increased by being installed in the Louvre during their absence from Venice.43 These included Tintoretto’s Saint Mark Liberates a Slave, Veronese’s Madonna with Child, Bassano’s Resurrection of Lazarus, Pordenone’s Altarpiece of Beato Lorenzo Giustiniani, Paris Bordone’s Presentation of the Fisherman’s Ring to the Doge of Venice, and Giovanni Contarini’s Doge Marino Grimani before the Madonna. These works were highlighted in the first room of the exhibition, the “Sala delle Pubbliche Funzione,” where Canova’s Polinnia was likewise displayed. Although meant to celebrate their return to their rightful owners, bringing these works and other Venetian masterpieces together underscored the impact that the French invasion had had on the arts in both Venice and Italy proper. The inherent logic that had structured the Louvre, which had been organized around the idea that cultural heritage should be available to 43 See Annibale Alberti, “Pietro Edwards e le opere d’arte tolte da Napoleone a Venezia,” Nuova antologia 61.1313 (1926): 336–338.

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everyone and which brought together pieces from both the royal and religious collections, was mimicked in the presentation that underlay the 1817 exhibition. Former altarpieces were desacralized; allegorical images and portraits that had once graced the Republic’s government buildings were likewise depoliticized. The Napoleonic suppressions were inadvertently a boon to the birth of the museum across the Italian peninsula. The early history of museums and exhibition practices merged with contemporary political preoccupations and became a crucible of the modern Italian state. As for the art objects themselves, although they had always been prized for their beauty, decontextualizing them guaranteed that they would be admired primarily for their aesthetic and technical successes. The systematic presentation of Venetian painting from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries reinforced the continuous stylistic development of what was called the Venetian school. This display was a powerful lesson for budding Academicians. 44 More importantly, the idea of stylistic progression of a school of painting is at the core of teleological interpretations of modern art. The dizzying array of masterpieces, hung one after the other in overwhelming succession, is made clear in the 1822 painting by Giuseppe Borsato of Canova’s funeral, which was also held in the Sala delle Pubbliche Funzione (Fig. 4.6). The layout of the paintings reproduced in Borsato’s work corresponds precisely to the printed catalogue of the 1817 exhibition, which clearly describes the paintings’ positions on the walls.45 Emanuele Antonio Cicogna (1789–1868), 44 Fabrizio Magani, “‘L’omaggio’ della scultura,” Canova e l’Accademia: Il maestro e gli allievi, ed. Fabrizio Magani and Paolo Mariuz (Treviso: Canova, 2002), 27. 45 Elenco degli oggetti di belle arti disposti nelle cinque sale apertesi nell’Agosto 1817 nella R. Accademia in Venezia ([Venezia]: Giuseppe Picotti, [1817]).

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Fig. 4.6: Giuseppe Borsato, Commemoration of Canova in the Scuola Grande della Carità, 1822. Oil on canvas, 61 × 78 cm. Ca’ Pesaro – Galleria Internazionale d’Arte Moderna, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY

the Venetian scholar and writer who donated his considerable library to the Museo Correr upon his death, responded to the display in his diary entry of August 12, 1817, writing, “Seeing is believing […] regarding the beautiful things exhibited in the rooms of the Accademia di Belle Arti—not so much those of the students as our ancient [i.e. Old Master] paintings.”46 Giuseppe

Bombardini’s poem “La Polinnia di Canova” was more ardent, situating Canova’s sculpture among “patriotic walls that boast recuperated canvases./Idly repentant and widowed/of their withering sword/are the hands that ravished them, cruel hands.”47 The seizure of works of art by the French remained a subtext throughout Cicognara’s

46 Cited in Camillo Tonini, “Le lunette ad affresco di Francesco Hayez per Palazzo Ducale a Venezia: Vicende storiche e fortuna critica,” in Francesco Hayez, ed. Francesco Mazzocca (Cinisello Balsamo, Milan: Silvana, 2015), 73, note 13.

47 Giuseppe Bombardini, La Polinnia di Canova offerta dalle provincie venete a s.m. imperatrice e regina. Ode di Giuseppe Bombardini. Dedicata ai deputati della congregazione centrale colleghi dell’autore ([Venezia]: [Tipografia di Alvisopoli], [1817]), vi.

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oration. Cicognara asked visitors to cast their eyes on the walls around them and admire the glories of Venetian art, “whose traditions had only been conserved through stories.”48 No other objects could better recall “the valor of Italian painting and the memory of its greatest heroes and religion.”49 Unfortunately, however, those recollections of valor, heroism, and accomplishments were no more than that, mere memories of past success. After seeing the prodigious development of Venetian painting in the sixteenth century, Venetians must have been aware, as Quatremère had been, that no contemporary painters could approach the technical and expressive accomplishments of the Old Masters. To add insult to injury, the way these paintings were returned to them was fraught. Repatriation of these objects was not accomplished through Venetian’s own political or military might, but rather only achieved by the aid (and greed) of the Austrians.50 The inclusion of these national treasures in the Accademia would always recall the specter of French looting, and the Austrian intervention which recuperated the works. Foreign visitors were particularly aware of this tension. John Broughton, for instance, wrote that “the Venetians can feel but little pride in pointing to the ‘St. Peter’ [by Titian] and the other recovered treasures of their academy. They lost them without a struggle, and recovered them without any efforts of their own—indeed, by the valour and generosity of the Transalpine barbarians whom they affect to despise.”51 The museum, then, created different meanings for 48 Cicognara, “Prolusione del conte Cicognara presidente dell’Accademia [1817],” 11. 49 Ibid., 16. 50 Cecil Hilton Monk Gould, Trophy of Conquest: The Musée Napoléon and the Creation of the Louvre (London: Faber and Faber, 1965), 126–127. 51 John Cam Hobhouse Broughton, Italy; Remarks Made in Several Visits, from the Year 1816 to 1854, 2 vols. (London: J. Murray, 1859), vol. 1, 148–149.

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different audiences. Even as the exhibition reveled in the glory of Venice’s past artistic successes, it nonetheless held the potential to signal the end of Venetian independence, for yet a second time.

Restoring Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin The political undercurrents of restitution proved to be a double-edged sword for Venetian pride. Even the cleaning of the paintings themselves, which should have been the source of great civic satisfaction, was fraught. Cicognara’s desire to clean and conserve many of these paintings should have provided an easy opportunity to revel both in the paintings’ spotless surfaces and in the professional status conservation had achieved in Venice proper. It was understood that Venetians were leaders in the field of art conservation—the majority of the paintings that had been taken by the French to the Louvre had been restored in Venice previously and their restorations had been admired in Paris.52 Yet, Cicognara’s desire to clean many of the paintings that had been given to the Accademia resulted in a disagreement between him and Pietro Edwards, the Accademia’s conservator, which focused on the centerpiece of the exhibition, Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin (Fig. 4.7). Titian’s painting, which had been completed and placed on the high altar of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari in 1518, had been earmarked in 1797 for the Louvre’s collection. Part of the list of the original eighteen paintings the French wished to take, the work was spared the treacherous journey to Paris largely as the result of Edwards’ intervention.53 Edwards had been elected director of the restoration of 52 Alberti, “Pietro Edwards,” 331–332. 53 Ibid., 330.

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Fig. 4.7: Titian, Assumption of the Virgin, 1516–1518. Oil on panel, 690 × 360 cm. Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, Italy. Cameraphoto Arte, Venice / Art Resource, NY

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public pictures of the Republic of Venice in the eighteenth century and was largely responsible for the professionalization of art conservation in Venice. After the French invasion he retained an official post and was responsible for the removal, packing, and shipping of many works of art. He was acutely aware of the delicate condition of numerous paintings, having restored them himself. Whenever possible, he objected to the transportation of large, fragile, and important pieces, stressing their damaged and decrepit state, or, ironically, any recent restorations, which he claimed made works more susceptible to damage during travel.54 Despite Edwards’ lamentations, numerous works were roughly removed from their original locations, but his intercession saved a few notable masterpieces including Titian’s Assumption, Tintoretto’s Last Judgment, and Giovanni Bellini’s San Giobbe Altarpiece. Edwards and Cicognara both cared immensely about the preservation of Venetian cultural heritage. Their opinions differed greatly, however, as to how precisely those cultural artifacts should be maintained, particularly where the Accademia’s treasures were concerned. Cicognara’s determination to have numerous paintings cleaned for the inauguration caused a rift between the two men, for Edwards’ approach to conservation was much more conservative than Cicognara’s.55 Yet by 1817, Edwards was seventy-three years old, ill, and increasingly withdrawn from the hands-on tasks that restoration required. Cicognara, in the meantime, was 54 Darrow, “Pietro Edwards,” 215–216. 55 For a recent study detailing the restoration of Ti­ tian’s Assumption, see Isabella Cecchini, “I Frari senza l’‘Assunta’: Le vicende del trasferimento della pala di Tiziano alle gallerie dell’Accademia nel 1816–1817,” in Canova, Tiziano e la basilica dei Frari a Venezia nell’Ottocento = Canova, Titian, and the Church of the Frari in Venice in the 19th Century, ed. Elena Catra, Isabella Collavizza, and Vittorio Pajusco (Treviso: ZeL Edizioni, 2017), 81–97.

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at the height of his power and brazenly occupied his position as director. He was successful in advocating for the conservation of the works, especially Titian’s Assumption. The zeal with which Cicognara pushed for the completion of these restorations was due to his personal connection to the works and his desire to publicize that connection. He identified his role as director of the Accademia as a quasi-religious one. In a letter to Canova dated August 5, 1815, Cicognara stressed his role as a savior of the arts, noting that it would comfort Canova to know that “these divine works from the sixteenth century, so dear to me” had been removed from their churches and brought to SS. Giovanni e Paolo, which was being used for storage and held the conservation laboratory.56 Cicognara wrote, “I have also rescued other works by Giovanni Bellini and the Carpaccio of San Giobbe, and the Assumption in the Frari, substituting other works in their place, and consigning them to the Accademia in the meantime. In this way the monuments of our art are worshipped and preserved.”57 The Titian held pride of place for Cicognara, who merged a myopic interest in the painting’s well-being with a broader recognition of the piece’s importance to the development of Venetian painting. He claimed proprietary status over the work, referring to it as “my Titian” in letters to Canova, and could not resist publicly referring to his role as benefactor of the arts in his introductory oration.58 Even as he praised the government for its generosity in supporting the Accademia and its new galleries, he underscored his own

56 Cited in Leopoldo Cicognara, Lettere ad Antonio Canova, ed. Gianni Venturi (Urbino: Argalia, 1973), 122. 57 Ibid., 122–123. 58 Cited in Paolo Mariuz, ed., Leopoldo Cicognara ad Antonio Canova: Lettere inedite della Fondazione Canova di Possagno (Cittadella: Bertoncello, 2000), 117.

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leadership.59 Appropriating the objects as his own, Cicognara gleefully pointed out that what hangs on the gallery walls is merely “the smallest part of the treasures that they gave me to preserve.”60 Cicognara’s self-promotion was successful, for he was widely credited with these works’ conservation—although this did not always earn him the respect which he desired. Count Bianchetti, who reluctantly had been convinced to surrender Canova’s Polinnia, indignantly suggested that Cicognara “would do better to mess around with bandages and Titian-esque patinas […] than covet the stuff of others.”61 Yet, it is true that many of the works were in desperate need of restoration. After being subject to centuries of candle smoke and incense in churches, the works were coated with a dark film that obscured the vibrant colors for which Venetian painting was noted. Time was by far a greater threat to works of art than even French greed (Fig. 4.8). The Assumption was particularly f ilthy.62 Even by the mid-1500s, merely thirty years after its completion, Giorgio Vasari wrote that the painting “may have been poorly taken care of [and] could not be seen well.”63 Things did not improve over the course of the next two centuries. In the eighteenth century, visitors who saw the work in the Frari commented more frequently on the dirt obscuring the painting 59 Cicognara, “Prolusione del Conte Cicognara Presidente dell’Accademia [1817],” 14. 60 Ibid., 13. 61 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 648. 62 Isabella Cecchini also notes the Assumption’s poor condition and its transformation after restoration. See Cecchini, “I Frari senza l’‘Assunta’,” 89 and 95. 63 Giorgio Vasari, “Descrizione dell’opere di Tiziano da Cador pittore,” in Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori, et architettori, ed. Rosanna Bettarini and Paola Barocchi, 6 vols. (Florence: Studi per edizioni scelte, 1987), vol. 6, 159, line 25.

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than on the work itself. Sir Richard Colt Hoare, the English antiquarian and archaeologist, felt it was “so dark, that is excellencies are scarcely perceptible,”64 while Philippe Petit-Radel, a French surgeon and writer, noted that although “connoisseurs still admired his [Titian’s] Assumption,” it had suffered from “the injuries of time, despite the curtain which always covered it.”65 Mariana Starke, the author of a popular travel guide to Italy, noted that the Assumption “is placed in a bad light, smoked, and dirty.”66 Even Joshua Reynolds pronounced it “most terribly dark,” albeit “nobly painted.”67 By 1815–1816 Hermann Friedländer’s only comment on the work was that it was “entirely covered with vapour and filth.”68 When the painting was f inally restored, Cicognara was delighted with the outcome. He wrote to Canova on May 24, 1817: “When you come to Venice, you will see a huge salon with the greatest ancient works from our school, which will impress you, and I dare say I think they are the best in Europe. The Assumption from the Frari is first, which was covered with a crust of smoke and incense inciting horror. Now it is splendid, the only painting to rival [Raphael’s] Transfiguration; if not that I, poor 64 Richard Colt Hoare, Recollections Abroad, during the Years 1785, 1786, 1787 (Bath: Richard Cruttwell, 1815), 357. 65 Phillipe Petit-Radel, Voyage historique, chorographique et philosophique dans les principales villes de l’Italie en 1811 et 1812, 3 vols. (Paris: Chanson and Firmin Didot, 1815), vol. 1, 174. 66 Mariana Starke, Travels in Italy, between the Years 1792 and 1798, 2 vols. (London: Phillips, 1802), vol. 2, 197. 67 William Cotton, Sir Joshua Reynolds’ Notes and Observations on Pictures, Chiefly of the Venetian School, Being Extracts from His Italian Sketch Books, ed. John Burnet (London: Longman, 1859), 30. 68 Herman [sic] Friedländer, Views in Italy, during a Journey in the Years 1815–1816 (London: Sir Richard Phillips, 1821), 26.

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Fig. 4.8: William Hogarth, Time Smoking a Picture, 1761. Etching, 23.3 × 18.5 cm. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

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devil, think it even more beautiful”69 (Fig. 4.9). Publicly, he was even more effusive:

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Here in front of you unfolds that prodigious monument, as if cleared from the obscure veil that removed it from public sight; it appears as if it was completed today in Titian’s studio. The grandeur of the style, the fire of the composition, the sublimity of the poetic invention, and the magic portentousness of the color attest now to the work in its most vigorous days. What divine ideality! What succulent color! What boldness of color! What composition, what form, what transparency! See the ecstatic marvel in which the Apostles, in such beautiful groups, surround the opened sarcophagus; glimpse how in these figures the chiaroscuro and foreshortening of Correggio are united, the pure drawing of Raphael, and how everything emerges magically from the mastery of Titian’s brush! Raise your eyes to the majestic Queen of Heaven, who with her look of reverence and affection, filled with heavenly love, and lifted by angelic choirs to the heavenly Father, is surrounded by a divine hierarchy, so varied and so beautifully disposed, that every artist contemplates her with marvel, without the courage or hope of equaling her. And what eloquence could describe the plumpness, the youthful and charming movements, the ingenious grace of the angels in such natural and diverse groups, if you did not have here, under your eyes, such a miracle? And which among the many schools of Italian painting could boast, after three centuries, of offering diffused on canvas, the real, the golden empire of rays of divine light, as if the immortal sphere itself had handled the brush of Titian?70

Besides reveling in the beauty of the newly cleaned work, in both public and private Cicognara broached the role of Venetian painting’s relationship to the art of the rest of the peninsula. In his letter to Canova, he privileged Titian’s Assumption over Raphael’s Transfiguration—arguably Raphael’s most important work. Obtaining Raphael’s painting, once the altarpiece of San Pietro in Montorio in Rome, had been the French’s highest priority. It had been vaunted as one of the highlights of the Musée Napoléon, but it too had recently been repatriated and returned to Rome. Cicognara’s comparison between the Titian and the Raphael reflected, in part, his project to promote the superiority of Venetian art and architecture over that of the rest of the peninsula. This one-upmanship emerged in multiple ways, not least of which his glee in having successfully obtained Canova’s Polinnia for the exhibition. He could not help remarking that since the statue left Rome “immediately after receiving the last touch of his chisel, […] Rome itself would only be able to admire the work from a cast,” and indeed a cast of the work is seen in Letterio Subba’s 1817 view of Canova’s studio.71 (Fig. 4.10). More importantly, however, the comparison between Raphael’s Transfiguration and Titian’s Assumption recalls the Renaissance debates regarding drawing (disegno) and color (colorito). In this aesthetic rivalry, central Italians, especially Florentines, mastered drawing, line, and composition. Color, on the other hand, was a particularly Venetian trait.72 By comparing Titian’s Assumption to Raphael’s Transfiguration, Cicognara argued for the supremacy of Venetian painting, of color over line. According

69 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 839. 70 Cicognara, “Prolusione del Conte Cicognara Presidente dell’Accademia [1817],” 11–13.

71 Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua, 3. 72 See David Rosand, Painting in Sixteenth-Century Venice: Titian, Veronese, Tintoretto, rev. ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

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Fig. 4.9: Raphael, The Transfiguration, 1817. Oil on panel, 410 × 279 cm. Pinacoteca, Vatican Museums, Vatican City State. Scala / Art Resource, NY

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Fig. 4.10: Letterio Subba, Antonio Canova in His Studio, ca. 1819. oil on canvas, 70 × 60 cm. Su concessione della Regione Siciliana, Assessorato dei Beni Culturali e della Identità siciliana – Dipartimento dei Beni Culturali e della Identità siciliana – Museo regionale interdiscipli­ nare di Messina

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to Cicognara, not only did Titian’s magisterial use of color surpass those of other Renaissance painters, but he was equally capable of creating dramatic line and chiaroscuro, uniting in his paintings the best of Raphael’s and Correggio’s styles. The genius of the Assumption therefore lay not only in its privileging of color over line but in the way it brought together the very best traits of all the Italian schools in one work of art. Titian could do it all. The painting could rival the cultural heritage of Rome and the artistic creations of Florence but was nonetheless distinctly Venetian. Visitors were equally impressed by the work’s luminosity. British journals announced the inauguration of the galleries and commented not only on Cicognara’s speech and Canova’s Polinnia, but also on the restoration of the Titian. The work, they wrote, that most “illuminated the hall with its splendor, was an immensely large and magnificent picture by Titian, which represents the Ascension of the Virgin; it was in a very dirty and neglected condition in the Church of de’Frati, where Count Cicognara perceived its beauty; and by the care of old Baldaccini [sic], […] it is restored in the highest perfection.”73 William Cadell, a British traveler, was awed by the way the Assumption “has been restored to brilliancy from almost total blackness,” and George Ticknor, an American professor of French and Spanish literature, admired the fact that the painting was “now, as it were, first produced to the world,” for previously, even in “the best and strongest light not a feature of the original work could be properly distinguished.”74 Lady Morgan 73 “Fine Arts. Italy. [Venice, Aug. 10, 1817],” The Literary Gazette, or Journal of Belles Lettres, Arts, Politics, &c. XXXIX (Saturday, Oct. 18, 1817): 248. 74 William Archibald Cadell, A Journey in Carniola, Italy, and France, in the Years 1817, 1818: Containing Remarks Relating to Language, Geography, History, Antiquities, Natural History, Science, Painting, Sculpture,

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likewise celebrated the way the previously “unnoticed” Assumption “was restored to its pristine beauty, and to all that unrivalled lustre of colouring for which Titian was so celebrated, and which is said to be conspicuous in this great picture beyond any other of his works.”75 The British painter George Hayter made an etching after the “recently discovered” painting, which he dedicated to Canova; it was the first reproductive print after the work, for the Assumption “[had] never been engraved” until Hayter did so.76 The same reviewer who praised Hayter’s etching also noted that when the Assumption had been in the Frari, it was half-hidden by a curtain, the altar, and candlesticks—not to mention dirt. There, “its existence as a picture was forgotten.”77 These feelings of awe were not limited to foreign tourists. Canova himself marveled at the work when he saw it during a day-long stop in Venice on July 17, 1819. The Assumption, he wrote to Cicognara, “triumphs over every expectation of every most heated fantasy. I was in paradise contemplating it for a long time, and according to me, I judge it, and keep it, and venerate it as the queen of all the paintings in the world.”78 Architecture, Agriculture, the Mechanical Arts and Manufacturers, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, 1820), vol. 1, 65; and George Ticknor, Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor, 7th ed., 2 vols. (Boston: James R. Osgood, 1877), vol. 1, 163–164. 75 Lady (Sydney) Morgan, Italy, 2 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, 1821), vol. 2, 469. 76 “Art. XVIII. The Assumption of the Virgin Mary, Etched by George Hayter, Esq. Member of the Academy of Luke, Rome, &C. From a Finished Sketch in Oils, by Himself, of the Celebrated Picture Recently Discovered at Venice, Painted by Titian. London, 1820,” Annals of the Fine Arts, For MDCCCXX V (1820): 427 and 430, respectively. 77 Ibid., 427–429. 78 Cited in Malamani, Un’amicizia di Antonio Canova, 167–168.

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This reaction thrilled Cicognara, who was “delighted that the masterpieces brought together in our Accademia, and arranged this way by me, pleased you, and that you are of the same mind that the Assumption is the greatest painting in the world.”79 In his letter to Canova, Cicognara stressed his agency in organizing the display of the paintings in the Accademia. It was visitors’ reactions, however, which most signaled the way that the signif icance of Titian’s Assumption was fundamentally changed due to its restoration and its placement within the museum. It was in 1817 that the work was truly understood, heralded, and seen as the masterpiece of Ti­ tian’s oeuvre. In the museum, the painting was f inally visible to viewers, as a picture—and it could be appreciated, admired, and, more importantly, copied and disseminated on a wide scale. No longer was it only a cult object meant to be worshipped because it celebrated the Virgin’s ascension into heaven. It was now a testament to Titian’s masterful use of color and light. The Assumption became the cornerstone of the “Venetian school” on an international scale only after its exhibition in the Accademia. The success of the restoration and the exhibition changed viewers’ understanding of the Assumption and secured Cicognara’s reputation. Decades later, the foundation of the Accademia continued to be heralded and credited to Cicognara’s intervention. In 1840, Countess Blessington felt that the Accademia was the ultimate testament to the Count, for “Cicognara, as long as this building stands, will require no other monument to prove his fine taste, and patriotism.”80 Likewise, Francesco 79 Cited in Mariuz, Leopoldo Cicognara ad Antonio Canova, 119, footnote 5. 80 Countess of Blessington [Marguerite Gardiner], The Idler in Italy, 3 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, 1840), vol. 3, 177.

Beltrame’s 1852 book on Titian commemorated Cicognara’s devotion to the artist. Beltrame dedicated several pages to the Assumption, its restoration, and even Cicognara’s oration at the Accademia’s inauguration. It was at the opening of the pinacoteca that Cicognara “returned [the painting], redressed in its native beauty, to the Arts and to Venice, which to this day we admire in sweet enraptured ecstasy.” 81 Through his appropriation and celebration of Titian, Cicognara cemented his position as connoisseur and cultural leader. On a broader scale, his cooption of the master established and reaffirmed Venetian institutions and national identity.

Establishing the Supremacy of Sculpture That Cicognara’s speech was worthy of comment even thirty-five years later testifies to his rhetorical skills. In a letter to Giulio Bernardo Tomitano on October 7, 1817, Cicognara himself acknowledged its bombast. His speech was meant to “move national ambition and touch the heart of everyone who heard it.”82 It was a dynamic performance intended to incite passion and patriotism. This was the job of the speeches given at the Accademia’s prize ceremonies. The exhibitions themselves showcased past and present work, while the lectures reinforced the legacies created visually between master and student, model and imitator. The role of the 81 Francesco Beltrame, Cenni illustrativi sul monumento a Tiziano Vecellio, aggiuntevi la vita dello stesso e notizie intorno al fu professore di scoltura Luigi Zandomeneghi (Venice: P. Naratovich, 1852), 29. 82 Cited in Franca Zaca Boccazzi, “Lettere inedite di Leopoldo Cicognara a Giulio Bernardo Tomitano,” Studi in onore di Elena Bassi, ed. Elena Bassi (Venice: Arsenale, 1998), 212.

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Fig. 4.11: Antonio Canova, Model for Portrait Bust of Elisa Baciocchi. Plaster, 42 × 28 × 28 cm. Museo Gypsotheca Antonio Canova – Possagno, Italy

orator was that of actor, guide, and authority in one. Cicognara’s discourse underscored the inherent drama of the moment even as it forged social ties among the audience members by creating artistic and political common ground. He recognized that to appeal to a wide audience, he had been forced to generalize, like a “theatrical painter, that has to paint scenery with broad strokes, who doesn’t refine, or treat his brushes his diligence.”83 “Didactic discourses,” he complained, that one might read “with pleasure at a desk, or at a small private gathering or academy 83 Ibid.

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circles” are not easy to concentrate on—and threaten to bore most listeners.84 As it had been in Naples in 1795, one of the preoccupations of Canova’s critics was their audience. Scholars carefully considered their mode of communication. Successful writing about art depended on the ability of the connoisseur to distinguish between types of discourses according to his audience. Cicognara understood that although the Accademia inauguration drew numerous erudite visitors, it was simply not the forum in which to present an overly intellectualized interpretation of either the Assumption or Canova’s Polinnia, or any of the other works on view. It was his need to share a more precise interpretation of Canova’s Polinnia—one that would lend itself to quiet study at a desk—that prompted Cicognara to publish a small pamphlet on the sculpture, Lettera sulla statua rappresentante la musa Polinnia scolpita dal M. Antonio Canova (1817). Although hardly less effusive than his public oration, the booklet was designed with two goals in mind: to appeal to a more academic audience and to correct misunderstandings regarding the sculpture’s iconography. Criticism had circulated in Venice regarding the transformation of Polinnia’s physiognomy from Elisa Bonaparte to an ideal muse, some of which were summarized by Emanuele Cicogna in his diary (Fig. 4.11). Some critics did not like her seated pose and wanted more signs that this was Polinnia and not another muse; “others wanted more expression in her face.”85 “In summary,” Cicogna wrote, “they conclude that while this statue is divine for the finesse of the work and especially for the admirable drapery, at the same time it is much less valuable compared to others by Canova 84 Ibid. 85 Cited in Mazzocca, “La ricomparsa di Polimnia,” 174.

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for it lacks invention.”86 Canova was thus once again criticized for his lack of creativity in the conception of the work. Given Cicognara’s defense of those works and Canova’s oeuvre as a whole, it is no surprise he wanted to defend Canova against these charges. In addressing these criticisms, Cicognara focused on the sculpture’s iconography and Napoleonic origins. To many viewers, the face remained tainted by lingering Bonapartist features and was not “ideal” enough—a criticism Cicognara felt was leveled against the work solely because viewers arrived armed with the foreknowledge of who the sculpture was originally meant to represent.87 No doubt visitors were particularly attuned to the sculpture’s previous identity because the placement of a work that once represented Elisa Bonaparte, in the middle of a room of repatriated paintings, would have inflamed nationalistic fervor and reanimated hostility towards the deposed Napoleonic dynasty. Like Napoleon’s other siblings, Elisa had been a political pawn whom he placed on the throne in Florence to consolidate his power. The recumbent pose mimicked that of sculptures Canova had made of Elisa’s mother and sister-in-law. The former was said to be based on the figure of Agrippina in the Capitoline Museum, although debates ensued as to whether she represented Agrippina the Elder, mother of Caligula, or Agrippina the Younger, mother of Nero.88 Either way, when Elisa was on the throne, the connection would have reiterated 86 Museo and Biblioteca Correr, Codice Cicogna 2845, page 4450. Partially cited in Mazzocca, “La ricomparsa di Polimnia,” 174. 87 Cicognara to Canova, August 23, 1817 in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 982. 88 Christopher M. S. Johns, Antonio Canova and the Politics of Patronage in Revolutionary and Napoleonic Europe (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 112–115.

both female authority and the way that authority was used to support the male sovereign. Even with her facial features transformed into those of an ideal muse, Polinnia commands authority, presiding over the space. Heavily draped, confidently seated, and surveying the room, she presents a striking contrast to the nude Venus Italica exhibited in spectacular fashion in the Palazzo Pitti in the same year. While the mirrors in the Gabinetto Rotondo continually redirected the viewer back to the nude sculpture, Polinnia’s outward, reflective gaze encouraged viewers to look from her back to the paintings surrounding her. Yet even as Polinnia’s posture reasserted Cicognara’s message about the cultural (if not political) revitalization of the Veneto, the transformation of Elisa into a female muse, the softening of the specificity of her features—indeed, the cancellation of her very identity—symbolized the erosion of female authority in the early nineteenth century. Although Elisa no longer occupied the throne, Cicognara must have recognized that Canova’s work for the Bonapartes could inflame the audience against him. Cicognara minimized the connection to Elisa, reiterating instead the connection to antiquity and reasserting his own agenda. He argued that Canova’s last minute alterations to the portrait reaffirmed the sculptor’s link to antiquity, for, he wrote, such transformations were typical of the ancients.89 Canova’s intimate understanding of ancient practices was further reinforced through his inclusion of an overabundance of references to the muse’s identity, a gesture, Cicognara argued, that had its roots in the ancients’ inclusion of inscriptions that identified the subjects of their work, for fear it might otherwise be misidentified.90 Finally, he argued, even if Canova had made the sculpture for the exhibition from the 89 Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua, 5–6. 90 Ibid., 10–11.

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very beginning, he would have selected precisely the same subject, for what could be more noble than a muse?91 Intermingled with antiquarian knowledge, Greek quotations, and references to Winckelmann and Visconti is Cicognara’s haughty awareness of his own expertise, which pits the ignorant, the amateur, and the connoisseur against one another. He challenges readers to engage him with a true antiquarian critique of the sculpture (even if it is negative!), even as he reveals his skepticism that they could do so.92 Although he finds the comments he overhears from members “of the lower class” “charming,” he is nonetheless gently condescending towards these visitors. One cannot expect much, after all, from viewers who are so ignorant regarding sculptural practice that they cannot identify the struts keeping Polinnia’s fragile fingers intact. These were credited by gullible viewers with having a secret meaning, one that only Canova himself could divine!93 Cicognara hoped that the statue’s display throughout the winter would lead viewers to increased appreciation of the work. The work’s prominence and accessibility within the museum furnished an easy opportunity for beholders to repeatedly visit the sculpture, to “see and re-see,” the work, without which, Cicognara felt, “they would not be able to understand its value.”94 Cicognara’s attitude reinforces Canova’s own approach towards the relationship between his works of art and their beholders. This type of lengthy engagement with the object—the seeing and re-seeing of Canova’s sculptures to better appreciate them—was precisely the type of viewing practice that the great artist himself encouraged. Viewers were meant to be active, engaged, and thoughtful in the presence of his 91 92 93 94

Ibid., 6–7. Ibid., 13. Ibid., 17. Ibid., 22.

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works. But even if visitors were immune to intellectual or aesthetic analysis of the piece, they would—and did—appreciate the sculpture’s more visceral charms. Average visitors and erudite viewers were amazed by Canova’s workmanship, but no one had a greater appreciation than other sculptors, who, Cicognara claimed, felt Polinnia no longer bore any resemblance to the block of stone from which she came.95 In Canova’s hands, the seated muse seemed a nearly breathing being, and the care with which he treated the marble drew the beholder’s eye around the work. The folds of Polinnia’s drapery are refined yet incredibly deep, and even though the muse is swathed in heavy fabric her body is clearly visible beneath the cloth (Fig. 4.12). In views from the side, the beholder’s eye cascades with the fabric to the very base of the sculpture, which stands out against the chair, cushion, and Grecian mask. Even the hair and neck are sculpted with remarkable delicacy. Only the gray veins that mottled the marble ruined the illusion, a defect that greatly disturbed Canova.96 In the context of this exhibition, however, Canova’s illusionism took on far greater significance when confronted and challenged by the Venetian paintings surrounding his sculpture. The juxtaposition of Titian’s Assumption and Canova’s Polinnia, which already aroused national sentiment, also revived a broader, art historical concern—that of the relationship between painting and sculpture. In his pamphlet, Cicognara described the setting and the relationships it underscored at great length: Canova’s Polinnia was exhibited in an immense salon, around which were distributed 95 Ibid., 14–15. 96 Cicognara to Canova, August 8, 1817, and August 23, 1817, in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 943 and 982, respectively. In his letters, Cicognara tried to ease the artist’s anxiety about the veined marble.

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Fig. 4.12: Antonio Canova, Polinnia (side view), 1817. Marble, 152 × 127 × 72 cm. Hofburg Imperial Palace, Vienna, Austria. © Mark E. Smith / Scala / Art Resource, NY

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masterpieces from Venetian brushes: and truthfully it was exposed to the greatest challenge to which a human work has ever been submitted. The paintings’ illusionistic triumph seemed like it should have been decisive and to conquer this work of reality, because it pleases men to be deceived, and a beautiful fiction has always been more applauded than a beautiful truth. Moreover, there was also the prestige of novelty, since, for the first time these famous paintings were disinterred—in a manner of speaking— from the dark. There, they were displayed and restored to their ancient splendor; so that the poor statue in the middle should have been afraid that the eye of the multitude would be distracted by the allure of color and relief of Titian’s, Tintoretto’s and Paolo’s [Veronese] masterpieces. And yet I swear to you, that even if few others reflected on this, I would never have believed that a work of the chisel could receive such full, such universal admiration, that these triumphs of ancient Venetian brushes could not harm it in any way. It seemed that there was a polite exchange between these arts, and I assure you that if the painted images were speaking, one could say in turn this marble that stood among them was pulsating, alive, flesh and blood, without achieving this effect through size or scale, without luxuriating in pure whiteness, without deceiving by any enchantment, but with the modesty and the discretion that seemed inspired by the author himself.97

In this passage, Cicognara argues for the preeminence of Canova’s sculpture over the paintings by the Venetian Old Masters. First and foremost, he situates Polinnia precisely within the space of its exhibition, in the Accademia and surrounded by the Renaissance paintings which are being seen for the first time in their newly restored 97 Cicognara, Lettera sulla statua, 20–22.

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glory. With periodic references to the tools on which each art relies—painting’s brush and sculpture’s chisel—Cicognara pits painting’s color and illusionism against sculpture’s “truth.” The former traits are precisely those which are said to make these particular paintings capable of speech. That is, in a remarkable rhetorical move, Cicognara refers to a long-standing tradition in which paintings were said to be “mute poetry” and instead asserts that they have a voice.98 These paintings, these luminous, restored Venetian masterpieces seemed capable of speech. Yet, Cicognara credits them with this gift only to turn around and assert the supremacy of sculpture. The paintings might well be able to speak, but only Canova’s sculpture could be said to live. Such a transformation, from hardened marble to breathing flesh, reaffirmed Canova’s status as the modern Pygmalion. More extraordinarily, however, Polinnia obtained this effect without having any obvious advantage. Neither grand in scale, nor even unmarred in its marble surface, it nonetheless triumphed over its painted rivals. The “challenge” to which Canova’s sculpture was exposed—the confrontation with Venetian painting, masterpieces of illusion and deception—has its roots in Renaissance arguments regarding the merits of sculpture versus painting. Arts of different media could be and often were compared to one another, even though each engaged a different realm of experience. Plutarch and Horace were among the first to explore the association between painting and literature, ut pictura poesis.99 As Claire Farago 98 For more on the tradition of painting as “mute poetry,” see the commentary by the editors in CharlesAlphonse Dufresnoy, De arte graphica (Paris, 1668), ed. Christopher Allen, Yasmin Haskell, and Frances Muecke (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 2005), esp. 216–228. 99 See Rensselear W. Lee, “Ut Pictura Poesis: The Humanistic Theory of Painting,” The Art Bulletin 22.4 (Dec.

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has argued, although the relationship between painting and sculpture had not been subject to the same scrutiny in antiquity, by the sixteenth century it was a serious line of inquiry.100 This conflict between the two media, which we now refer to as the paragone and understand largely as challenge for supremacy between the arts, began simply as a comparison between the two. When Vasari first used the word “paragon” in the mid-sixteenth century, he intended it with this def inition, “comparison.”101 Fifty years before him, Leonardo da Vinci was among the first writers to ponder the differences between painting and sculpture. Although Leonardo’s thoughts on the paragone have only come to us in fragments, and most of those are from the hand of his pupil and heir Francesco Melzi, his comments on the paragone have become something of a truism. Painting was characterized as an intellectual craft, while sculpture was largely mechanical.102 Sculpting was a form of labor that generated sweat and fatigue, and the sculptor was doomed to be forever dirty, covered in marble chips and dust. Worse, his art “is not a science,” for “sculpture ends by demonstrating to the eye only what is what and does not lend itself to admiration by contemplation.” Painting, on the other hand, was an art of illusion, for “by the power of science, demonstrates the grandest countrysides with distant horizons on one flat surface.”103 1940): 197–269 and Frederick Hard, “Some Interrelations between the Literary and the Plastic Arts in 16th and 17th Century England,” College Art Journal 10.3 (Spring 1951): 233–243. 100 Claire J. Farago, ed., Leonardo da Vinci’s Paragone: A Critical Interpretation with a New Edition of the Text in the Codex Urbinas (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), 383–384. 101 Leatrice Mendelsohn, Paragoni: Benedetto Varchi’s “Due Lezzioni” and Cinquecento Art Theory (Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press, 1982), 212, note 1. 102 Farago, Leonardo da Vinci’s Paragone, 257. 103 As cited in ibid., 257.

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What began as a theoretical inquiry was quickly transformed into a concrete challenge, as artists across the Italian peninsula weighed in on the merits of their media. The idea that one art necessarily had to prevail over the other emerged in a striking web of personal and professional rivalries, as Rona Goffen has shown. 104 Michelangelo, Giorgione, Titian, and Raphael all entered the competition, and particularly contentious was the relationship between Florentine sculptors and Venetian painters. Paolo Pino and Giorgio Vasari, for instance, speak of Giorgione’s rivalry with Florentine artists, particularly the sculptor Andrea del Verrocchio.105 This enmity prompted Giorgione to paint an image of Saint George with mirrors and multiple reflections to flaunt the fact that a painter could make an entire figure visible in one glance—a feat a sculptor could never accomplish. The painting was the epitome of perfection, “perfectly conceived in all the three parts of painting, that is design, invention and color, disegno, invenzione e colorire.”106 Likewise Titian also took up the challenge, approaching the theme numerous times in his paintings.107 Goffen suggests that Michelangelo’s greatest rival was Titian himself, although the two were only known to have met once.108 Various European theorists, painters, and sculptors in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries continued to address the paragone in their writing and works of art.109 It was the publication of a newly discovered codex by 104 Rona Goffen, Renaissance Rivals: Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2002), 26. 105 Ibid., 61–62. 106 Paolo Pino, as cited in ibid., 61. 107 Ibid., chapter 7, esp. 385. 108 Ibid., 267. 109 For a concise history of the paragone from antiquity to the nineteenth century, see Sarah Lippert, The Paragone in Nineteenth-Century Art (Abingdon, Oxon:

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Leonardo that brought the issue to the fore in the early nineteenth century. The Codex Urbinas 1270 contained a compilation of passages selected from various Leonardo manuscripts and brought together by Melzi around 1530.110 Rediscovered in 1797, in the midst of the French looting of the Vatican Library, it was published in 1817 by Guglielmo Manzi with the title “Paragone,” giving the word its modern connotations.111 Cicognara owned a copy of the work, as well as numerous other treatises that dealt with the issue.112 No matter the degree to which Leonardo’s own thoughts on the paragone were filtered through Melzi and then subsequent interpretations, there is no doubt that the issue was still a critical one in 1817. We have already seen how insistently Canova tried to distance himself from the suggestion that sculpture was a purely mechanical art. Similarly, the arguments surrounding Venus and Adonis in Naples were an attempt to discern how much of the sculptor’s craft was the work of the mind and how much the work of the chisel. These were arguments inherent to the debate of the status of sculpture versus painting, and they remained important throughout Canova’s career. Although we cannot be sure that Cicognara had Leonardo’s treatise in mind, it is nonetheless clear that the overall structure of the exhibition engendered a comparison between the two arts. First, the presentation of Polinnia challenged the idea that it was outside Routledge, 2018), chapter 1, “An Introduction to the Paragone,” 1–25. 110 Mendelsohn, Paragoni, 37. 111 Farago, Leonardo da Vinci’s Paragone, 8 and 10, respectively. 112 Cicognara had several works relating to this idea in his library. See Leopoldo Cicognara, Catalogo ragionato dei libri d’arte e d’antichità posseduti dal conte Cicognara, 2 vols. (Pisa: Niccolò Capurro co’caratteri di F. Didot, 1821), vol. 1, 17–18, 20–21, 25, 30, 36, 37, 39, 69, respectively.

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the province of sculpture to present multiple views of a work of art together at any one given moment. The Renaissance’s idea of sculptural form was limited by the notion of the ideal viewpoint. For Leonardo, for instance, “[to] make a figure in the round, the sculptor makes only two f igures, and there need not be an infinite number for infinite views to be seen. Of these two figures, one is seen from the front and the other from behind, and this is proved to be no different from facing a figure made in medium relief.”113 This idea of the static nature of sculpture was shattered in the seventeenth century by the Baroque inventions of Bernini and others. Although Canova was thought to have abandoned Bernini’s theatricality by returning sculpture to its classical origins, some of Bernini’s influence remained. Canova’s approach to sculptural technique destabilizes his works, for his refined chiseling and lustrous surface create a dynamic sensation that invites the beholder to move around his pieces.114 In fact, Canova’s treatment of marble was so sensitive that critics used a painterly vocabulary to describe it. Quatremère de Quincy referred to Canova’s “instinct de peintre,” while Canova’s friend and assistant, Antonio d’Este, and Melchior Missirini, one of his biographers, both used the term “impasto” to describe Canova’s workmanship.115 Other writers commented 113 Cited in Farago, Leonardo da Vinci’s Paragone, 263. 114 Alex Potts, The Sculptural Imagination: Figurative, Modernist, Minimalist (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000), 42. 115 Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages, 134; Antonio d’Este, Memorie di Antonio Canova, ed. Paolo Mariuz (Florence: Felice le Monnier, 1864; Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 1999), 32; and Melchior Missirini, Della vita di Antonio Canova: Libri quattro, ed. Francesco Leone (Prato: Frat. Giachetti, 1824; Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2004), 91 and 336, respectively.

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on Canova’s “manner of handling” the marble, and the way the sculptor “imagined that a sort of empâtement, or fleshiness¸ which was the object of his idolatry in painting, could be extended with advantage to sculpture. Hence all is flowing, round, and I might almost say blurred and muddy; all that is masculine, sharp, and clear, is wasted and rubbed away.”116 Writers exploited Canova’s painterly sensibility to render the comparison to Titian explicit; Giovanni Gherardo de Rossi described Canova’s Monument to Angelo Emo by suggesting “that the head of Emo was sculpted by the chisel of Canova as it would have been painted by the brush of Titian.”117 If the treatment of the marble were not enough to defy the static interpretation of the medium, Polinnia, like so many other Canova sculptures, was set upon a rotating pedestal, “where it turns with a breath of air when a window is open, and with the slightest pressure of a damsel’s pinky finger.”118 Despite Polinnia’s motion, viewers of the sculpture were of course forced to see its multiple views sequentially, rather than simultaneously. This was another of Leonardo’s critiques. The rotating pedestal, however, did, at the very least, prevent such views from being entirely contingent on the viewers’ movement around the work. At the 116 “Walks in Rome and Its Environs. No. VI. Thorwaltzen the Sculptor,” The New Monthly Magazine and Literary Journal 19. Part 1. Original Papers (1827): 229. 117 Giovanni Gherardo de Rossi, Lettera sopra un monumento recentemente scolpito dall’illustre scultore sig. Antonio Canova [1795], in Biblioteca Canoviana, ossia raccolta delle migliori prose, e de’ più scelti componimenti poetici sulla vita, sulle opere ed in morte di Antonio Canova, ed. Arnaldo Bruni, Manlio Pastore Stocchi, and Gianni Venturi, 2 vols. (Bassano del Grappa: Istituto di ricerca per gli studi su Canova e il neoclassicismo, 2005), vol. 2, 152–153. 118 Letter from Cicognara to Canova, August 8, 1817, in Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 942–943.

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same time, the constant movement of Canova’s works suggests there is no one ideal viewpoint from which to see his sculptures. To be fully appreciated, they must be admired from all possible angles. These techniques reinforce how Canova insistently imagined his sculpture in three dimensions, an attitude that is further reinforced by the reproduction of Canova’s sculptures in prints.119 Canova often had his sculptures engraved from multiple points of view that would be printed together on the same sheet of paper. Such was the case with the prints of Polinnia published in the catalogue of the 1818 Omaggio exhibition (Fig. 4.13). This manner of thinking “in the round” is also visible in some of Canova’s drawings, such as this seated female figure, on which the artist pasted a small flap of paper with an alternate profile (Figs. 4.14 and 4.15). This allows the viewer (and the artist) to change the direction she faces, revealing the way Canova explored the composition of his sculptures and even turned his drawings into interactive works of art. Finally, and most importantly, the exhibition raised the question of illusionism. Painting, by creating three-dimensional space on a twodimensional surface, would seem to conquer sculpture in this respect. Such illusion surprises and deceives our senses. Our sense of touch reveals the flat surface, even as our sight conveys space and dimension. It is a deception, Cicognara recalls, that is ultimately pleasurable. Viewers confronted with the exhibition at the Accademia were sure to be dazzled by the paintings on the walls. Newly cleaned, newly presented to the Venetian public, the vibrant red, orange, and golden hues would have stood out against the dark walls of the salon. Light from the windows would have fallen onto the paintings, further 119 See Grazia Bernini Pezzini, Fabio Fiorani, and Hugh Honour, eds., Canova e l’incisione (Bassano del Grappa: Ghedina & Tassotti, 1993).

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Fig. 4.13: Pietro Fontana, Engraving of Canova’s Polinnia, from L’omaggio delle Provincie Venete alla Maestà di Carolina Augusta, Imperatrice d’Austria. Venice: Dalla tipografia di Alvisopoli, 1818. Signature: Quellen.Guiden.Ital.Vene.-048; Vienna University Library

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Fig. 4.14: Antonio Canova, Seated Woman, n.d. Tab lowered, showing profile view. Pencil drawing, 21.4 × 15.7 cm. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy

Fig. 4.15: Antonio Canova, Seated Woman, n.d. Tab raised. Pencil drawing, 21.4 × 15.7 cm. Musei Civici di Bassano del Grappa, Italy

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highlighting the panels of gold leaf present in so many of the works. Visitors would have been moved by the sequence of great paintings with so many with religious themes, particularly those images of the Madonna, who held a place most dear in the hearts of the Venetians. Many paintings depicted great religious and political men, so that the illustrious figures of Venetian history seemed to inhabit the same space as the beholders. Venetian political and artistic heritage were fully restored in these images and in the exhibition. Yet, despite the chimerical colors of the paintings, Canova’s Polinnia rose to the challenge, slowly drawing increasingly large numbers of visitors around her. Despite Leonardo’s claim that sculpture did not invite contemplation, Cicognara suggests that that is precisely what occurred in the exhibition. Visitors were captivated by the relative whiteness and purity of the work, by the way marble seemed malleable and transformed into living flesh. The body of the muse seemed to breath palpably beneath her heavy robes, and the gentle way she turned would allow viewers to admire all of Canova’s handiwork. The delicate flowers woven together in a wreath, the soft cushion, complete with tassels, on which she sat, the buttons and delicate embroidery on her robe, even the fragile legs of the chair on which she sat were all worthy of attention. Viewers spent so much time with the work, it startled their senses with a different kind of illusion, in which marble seemed to be no longer stone. Responses to the juxtaposition between Canova’s Polinnia and Titian’s Assumption established that both artists were masters of illusion in their respective media. Titian was said to be the “painter of flesh,” just as Canova’s sculptures were “vera carne.”120 Titian overwhelmed the 120 Joris van Gastel has recently discussed seventeenthcentury critiques which celebrate, in sculptural terms,

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beholder with color, light, and space, Canova with the sensation that marble could be soft and malleable. Both artists seemed to animate their subjects, creating the illusion of life. Sculpture and painting were thus equally appreciated by the beholder in the Accademia exhibition. The comparison reinforced the idea that illusionism was a particularly Venetian artistic trait that superseded the limitations of media—even as it stressed how these were aspects of Canova’s sculpture that were unique to his treatment of marble alone. Cicognara’s preoccupation with the beholder’s appreciation of both painting and sculpture, of Titian and Canova, reflects the shift that had occurred in the understanding of the paragone in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As Jacqueline Lichtenstein has argued, in this period attention was displaced from artist to beholder. The viewer’s senses, reaction, and response to the work took precedence over the artist’s talent in rendering material or creating a successful illusion, and the beholder became the true subject of the paragone.121 His point of view and the effect the object wrought on his senses were more important than the artist’s mastery over the material. Lichtenstein argues that this shift occurred largely in France, as writers and theorists, particularly Roger de Piles, reconsidered the paragone and its relationship to academic training and the relationship between drawing and painting and line and color.122 This constituted a break with Italian notions of the paragone promoted by Renaissance Titian’s ability to paint flesh. See Joris van Gastel, Il marmo spirante: Sculpture and Experience in Seventeenth-Century Rome (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2013), esp. 137–144. 121 Jacqueline Lichtenstein, The Blind Spot: An Essay on the Relations between Painting and Sculpture in the Modern Age (Los Angeles: The Getty Research Institute, 2008), 5–6. 122 Ibid., 6–8.

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and Baroque artists who emphasized the artist’s role. The impact of French theory was felt in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Italy. This transformation is made clear in the architect Giannantonio Selva’s comments on the exhibition. In a letter to Canova on August 18, 1817, he wrote, “If Titian were standing where his divine painting is placed, if Canova were where his Polinia [sic] is, they would not cease to reciprocally admire each other, without envying one another.”123 Here, Selva imagines the artists standing near, perhaps even standing in for, their respective works. Titian and Canova are envisioned as both creators and beholders, and in Selva’s view, each is worthy of the other’s admiration. Cicognara’s emphasis on the viewer’s understanding of the paragone not only reflects transformations in artistic theory, but also, and perhaps more concretely, reflects the increased importance of the viewer’s role in a period which saw the rise of public museums and gallery spaces and the circulation of visitors and tourists as never before. It is understandable, then, that the importance of display and of reception would go hand in hand with a shifting understanding of theory. Cicognara rendered the competition between painting and sculpture visible through his display of Canova’s work; it was not merely a rhetorical exercise. In the Accademia’s exhibition, he publicly manifested the transformations in the understanding of the paragone. No longer was it a question of artists highlighting the strengths of their medium. Instead, the key was the way beholders perceived the comparison between painting and sculpture. Cicognara created a frame which would allow viewers to best appreciate and understand Canova’s and Titian’s work in relation to one another.

123 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 974.

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The inauguration of the Accademia’s pinacoteca is the birth of what we might think of as the “special exhibition,” where a permanent collection (the Accademia’s paintings) was enhanced by the temporary display of a loaned object (Canova’s Polinnia). Cicognara, in his organization of the exhibition, behaved much like a modern museum director. He enacted the paragone in the construct of the exhibition itself. He financed the project. He considered the cultural and political significance of the display. Under his guidance the new museum became the testing ground for artistic theory. In his systematization of the display, Cicognara forged a new path for the modern appreciation of sculpture and art in general. The exhibition not only confirmed the fact that Canova, as a modern-day master, was worthy of having his sculptures placed in a museum with ancient masterpieces, but it also reaffirmed the importance the museum itself, as an institution, had in defining what constituted a “masterpiece.” In addition, Cicognara’s reliance on the paragone in the structure of the exhibition also ref lects a concern that is specif ic to sculpture, and which was, as we have seen, a continuous preoccupation for sculptors and theorists alike—finding a comprehensible way of explaining or expressing sculptural qualities. Sculpture can be notoriously difficult for viewers to understand and for critics to discuss. In an exhibition designed to unify the Venetian public, Cicognara had to ensure that everyone attending, lower and upper classes, amateurs and connoisseurs alike, would be able to appreciate his intended meaning, regardless of their knowledge of history or technique. The staging of the paragone, and Cicognara’s return to it in his text, reflects the way he attempted to negotiate a new language for viewers that overcame the difficulties of sculpture by privileging their position and their understanding of the work. Cicognara’s deliberate comparison between

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Canova and Titian created a comprehensible narrative for the audience. He was conscious of the different visitors who would attend the Accademia exhibition, many of whom were not connoisseurs. Yet, even without formal training, the average visitor could understand and respond viscerally to the comparison Cicognara created between Canova and Titian, between sculpture and painting. Given Cicognara’s personal scholarly ambitions, he had a vested interest in reiterating the message that sculpture was not merely a craft, but an art. In the confrontation between media, Cicognara’s personal, professional, and political ambitions merged, enabling him to bring to the fore questions of how one could best view, interpret, judge, and discuss a work of sculpture. By indirectly arguing for the supremacy of sculpture through the exhibition, and doing so directly in his writing, he placed contemporary Italy and his own scholarship about sculpture on par with some of the greatest works and treatises in the history of art. Despite Cicognara’s passion for Venetian painting and its illusionistic grandeur, it is sculpture—“reality”—that ultimately triumphs. In a private letter to Canova, Cicognara could not resist reiterating Polinnia’s victory: Polinnia so dominates the great room where she is placed in the center, that she produces a marvelous effect, and that which is most striking of all is the triumph of reality over objects of illusion. This room, full of masterpieces of marvelous art, among which there is the most beautiful Titian that human eyes have ever seen, which stunned everyone who entered who had eyes, now it cedes all to relief, to truth, and the poor picture must be content to act as the backdrop to a work of the chisel.124

124 Canova, Epistolario (1816–1817), vol. 2, 942–943.

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In the end, Titian’s Assumption gave way completely to Canova’s Polinnia. What began as a “polite exchange” between the arts ended with Polinnia’s “domination.” According to Cicognara, the painting, despite being the most beautiful of Titian’s oeuvre, lost the battle for spectators’ attention and became merely a backdrop to the sculptor’s remarkable work. With the Accademia exhibition then, Cicognara established a victory for Canova on multiple levels, thus reversing long standing hierarchies in the arts. Not only did Canova’s sculpture surpass Titian’s painting, but in so doing, the comparison reaffirmed the supremacy of modern art and artists over ancient ones. In addition, Cicognara’s prioritization of “reality” and “truth” over “illusion,” and his repeated references to the visual effects of Titian’s painting—which “stunned everyone who entered who had eyes”—inverts the hierarchy of the senses. While painting and its illusionistic qualities privilege vision, sculpture appeals to viewers’ desire to touch. Touch was potentially dangerous, as we have seen, but it also revealed the deceptive nature of painting and vision. Although Cicognara never directly refers to touch in his speeches, touch most clearly revealed the “reality” of sculpture. Moreover, it was universal; Cicognara’s specification that the paintings would overwhelm those spectators “who had eyes,” recalls the specter of the blind man who would be unmoved by the illusion of painting.125 Even the blind, however, could touch and appreciate marble. Touch thus revealed the Polinnia’s true nature as stone, but rather than dispelling the illusion the marble created, it simply increased the viewers’ wonder at Canova’s skill. For those viewers who would dare to touch the marble, the form remained 125 See Lichtenstein, The Blind Spot, 55–72, for an extensive discussion of the senses in relation to the paragone.

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concrete, indissoluble. It did not deceive them. It impressed them with its very solidity and substance, and it was precisely this truthfulness which swayed defenders of sculpture. As a result, Cicognara’s reference to Titian’s work as “la pittura” rather than “il quadro” renders Polinnia’s victory even more absolute. The ambivalence

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of the phrase, which seems to refer not only to the painting, but to painting as a medium more broadly, extends Cicognara’s use of paragone. It is no longer simply the Assumption that has ceded to Polinnia, but the entire medium of painting which has succumbed to that of sculpture.

5. Defining Modern Sculpture Abstract: Chapter five, “Defining Modern Sculpture,” explores the exhibition of Canova’s Penitent Magdalene in Paris. Exhibited first in the 1808 Salon and subsequently in an intimate space in the townhouse of Giambattista Sommariva, Penitent Magdalene launched a discussion about “expression” and the emotional resonance of art. Self-reflection on the part of beholders reinforced notions of individuality and the self and established Canova’s Magdalene as a particularly French and modern work. It also forged a direct link between emotional resonance and aesthetic value. The focus on expression established a universal model by which sculpture could be appreciated and relied upon accessible conceptions of empathy and lived human experience. Keywords: Penitent Magdalene, expression, empathy, modern sculpture, Paris, conception of the self

Although sculpture reigned supreme in Italy for much of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, this was not the case for the rest of the continent. In France, for instance, which was quickly becoming the center of the modern art world, sculpture held an uneasy place. The rapid changes in political regimes and cultural mores privileged painting because of its relative speed of completion. Sculpture—with its immobility, solidity, and lengthy production time—seemed to be thoroughly associated with antiquity and the past. But critics’ complex responses to Canova’s Penitent Magdalene, which was exhibited in Paris at the Salon of 1808 and then subsequently in the collection of Giambattista Sommariva, interrogated how sculpture might be a modern art. Canova’s depiction of Magdalene’s anguish, her “expression,” seemed to capture sentiment in stone and transcend the limitations of the medium.

A Foreign Artist in France Although Canova had achieved international fame by the end of the eighteenth century, the f irst public exhibition of his works in Paris did not occur until the 1804 Salon. Four years later, four of Canova’s marble statues, Penitent Magdalene, Hebe, Madame Mère, and Standing Cupid and Psyche, were exhibited in the 1808 Salon. Of those, Madame Mère was the most widely applauded, perhaps because no one dared criticize the representation of Napoleon’s mother. Hebe and Cupid and Psyche received mixed reviews, but it was Penitent Magdalene that inspired the most commentary (Fig. 5.1). She and Madame Mère are given pride of place in Louis-Léopold Boilly’s Napoleon Honoring the Sculptor Cartellier at the Salon of 1808 (Fig. 5.2). Although we cannot take Boilly’s representation as a strictly literal view of the space, the painting does give a sense of the

Ferando, C., Exhibiting Antonio Canova: Display and the Transformation of Sculptural Theory. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2023 doi 10.5117/ 9789463724098_ch05

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Fig. 5.1: Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene, 1796. Marble and gilded bronze, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. Genova, Musei di Strada Nuova – Palazzo Tursi, Italy. (© Musei di Strada Nuova, Genova)

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Fig. 5.2: Louis-Léopold Boilly, Napoleon Honoring the Sculptor Cartellier at the Salon of 1808. Oil on canvas, 42 × 61.5 cm. Napoleonmuseum, Arenenberg, Switzerland

overall shape of the sculpture court and how it may have appeared when crowded with visitors. And, it would have been crowded, for the 1808 Salon was widely attended. The public, by all accounts, adored the works, particularly Penitent Magdalene. The work, which had been completed in 1796, was already known to the French by reputation. Quatremère had been eager to secure the sculpture for exhibition several years prior to the 1808 Salon. He obtained his wish once the original marble, which had changed hands several times after its completion in 1796, was purchased by Giambattista Sommariva

in March 1808.1 A lawyer, businessman, and politician from Milan, Sommariva was always eager to promote his outstanding collection of fine art. A frequent contributor to the Salon, he was convinced easily by Vivant Denon to add Penitent Magdalene to the other three Canova sculptures on view in 1808. Many articles about the Salon discussed the work. Overwhelmingly, critics were irked by the attention the foreign sculptor received. J. D…Y [J. 1 For details of the sculpture and its history, see Fernando Mazzocca, “G. B. Sommariva o il borghese mecenate: Il ‘cabinet’ neoclassico di Parigi, la galleria romantica di Tremezzo,” Itinerari 2.145–293 (1981): 145–293.

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Dusalchoy?], for instance, was irate that Canova stole the thunder from French artists. His was among the first reviews to be published after the opening of the Salon on October 14, 1808. J. D…Y was particularly irritated by the way the public fawned over the Magdalene, lamenting the way the “crowd stopped in front of it, as if in front of a masterpiece.”2 Their wonder, he argued, could be attributed to the fact that they were seduced by Canova’s finishing techniques, for as he had with other works, Canova tinted the surface of the flesh light yellow and even applied rouge to Magdalene’s lips and cheeks. This was duplicitous, for “the yellow tint of the marble even gives the statue the appearance of an antique that leads to favorable opinions from the amateurs and the curious.”3 Moreover, he bitterly complained that a foreign artist should not receive so much attention when there were so many French artists who were far more important; by promoting Canova’s work, the French were “depreciating [their] own riches.”4 Canova’s status as a foreigner was discussed by multiple journalists who exhibited a self-conscious nationalism in their response to Canova’s work. The Salon had traditionally been a space which asserted France’s cultural prowess.5 Although the French Revolution had opened the doors of the Salon to both non-Academicians and foreign artists, it nonetheless was seen by French artists and critics alike as a space in which local (native) artists should be promoted. Its ability to shape the cultural landscape—mimicked and expanded, of course, by the power of the press—was meant to celebrate the nation’s artistic riches. Canova, however talented, was 2 J. D.…Y [J. Dusalchoy?], “Beaux-arts. Salon de 1808,” Journal des arts, des sciences, de littérature et de politique 10. Année, 2 Trim (22 Octobre 1808): 426. 3 Ibid., 426–427. 4 Ibid., 426. 5 See Dominique Lobstein, Les salons au XIXe siècle: Paris, capitale des arts (Paris: Martinière, 2006).

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a mere interloper. Reaction against Canova’s sculptures in the Salon reflected discomfort by Parisians that an outsider encroached on and threatened their cultural preeminence. It was not simply Canova’s status as a foreign artist that raised French critics’ hackles, but his position as an Italian sculptor. Italy had been a leading destination for aspiring artists for centuries; tension between the two nations was inevitable. This was particularly true in the field of sculpture, given the legacy of Michelangelo and Bernini. Even though it was commonplace in both France and Italy to suggest that Italian sculpture had fallen into a state of decadence, Canova was considered the sole reinvigorator of the medium. Numerous critical accounts of Canova’s oeuvre in the Parisian journals insisted on asserting the quality of French sculptors, but Canova lacked an obvious counterpart in France. There was no French sculptor who stood out as Jacques-Louis David had done in the field of painting. Because of this disparity between media, French authors continually vaunted their own nation’s riches in painting, a field where modern artists could easily claim superiority over the Italians.

Romanticizing Artistic Production Critics thus raised the relationship between sculpture and painting in multiple ways when discussing Canova’s sculptures. First, French authors introduced painting in their discussion of sculpture to establish the superiority of French artists in the cultural competition between Italy and France. Second, because Canova tinted the marble of Penitent Magdalene and Hebe and added bronze elements to both works, critics also vigorously debated what was appropriate to sculpture versus painting.6 In essence, they 6 See, for instance, Victorin Fabre, “Salon de peinture. Huitième article. Sculptures,” Mercure de France, journal

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were arguing over medium specificity. Penitent Magdalene’s yellowed skin and red lips and cheeks, in combination with the bronze cross she held in her lap, brought forth many anxieties about the nature of sculpture. Since carving in marble relied on the careful removal of layers of stone, adding decorative components to that excised shell seemed to counter the subtractive nature of the medium. Moreover, critics were not swayed by arguments such as those put forth by Quatremère that Canova’s practices could be justified by the sculptural practices of antiquity. M. B. was blunt; although he acknowledged that the ancients used silver and stone in their work, he nonetheless asked, “[B]ut did the ancients not also have their age of ignorance and their centuries of barbaric luxury?”7 This debate resurrected the quarrel between the “ancients” and the “moderns” of the seventeenth century, but with a new focus.8 Arguments over Canova’s sculptural practice not only reflected the desire to understand how knowledge of antiquity could affect contemporary artistic production, but also how this knowledge could then be historique, politique et littéraire (Decembre 1808): 604; C.-P. Landon, Salon de 1808; Recueil de pièces choisies parmi les ouvrages de peinture et de sculpture exposés au Louvre le 14 Octobre 1808, et autres productions nouvelles et inédites de l’école française (Paris: C.-P. Landon, 1808), vol. 1, 81–82, and vol. 2, 20; and M. Ro… [François-Guillaume Ducray-Duminil], “Salon des tableaux par (M. Ro…) Journal des petites affiches de Paris. Ducret Duminil rédacteur,” Collection de pièces sur les beaux-arts (1673–1808), dite Collection Deloynes, ed. Bibliothèque Nationale (France), vol. 44, no. 1149 (Paris: La Bibliothèque, 1980), 636–638. 7 M. B. [Jean-Baptiste Boutard], “Beaux-arts. Salon de 1808. N. XVIII. Sculpture. M. Canova,” Journal de l’Empire (4 Janvier 1809): 4. 8 Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, “Sur M. Canova et les quatre ouvrages qu’on voit de lui à l’exposition publique de 1808: par M. Quatremère de Quinci [sic],” Gazette nationale ou le moniteur universel 565 (Dec. 28, 1808): 1430.

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negotiated to accord with the taste of modern viewers. The tension between authenticity in artistic practice and the modern taste for purity and “whiteness” thus raged throughout the century. Consideration of sculptural production also led critics to speak about a more elusive quality that defined the relationship between painting and sculpture—what we might call “painterliness” in the production of the work itself.9 This was true broadly about Canova’s work, but also specifically applied to the Penitent Magdalene.10 Quatremère, for instance, seized upon the freedom with which Canova handled the marble, the work’s sentiment and expression, and the treatment of Magdalene’s hair and head, all of which gave the sculpture “the taste and harmony of color in painting.”11 In response to critiques over this aspect of the Penitent Magdalene, Quatremère confessed reluctantly, “I agree that there is the feeling of a painter in this work. […] Who is not to say that it is to this sentiment itself that Canova owes the grace which enchants all of his works, the softness of the pose, the kindness of physiology, the gracious movements, the soft forms and the flattering marble work

9 See, for instance Sergei Androsov et al., eds., Canova: L’ideale classico tra scultura e pittura (Cinisello Balsamo, Milan: Silvana, 2009), and especially the essay by Fernando Mazzocca, “Canova: L’ideale classico tra scultura e pittura,” 25–43. 10 Several scholars reference the debates on Penitent Magdalene’s painterliness, including Mazzocca, “Canova: L’ideale classico,”; Franco Boggero, “Una rilettura critica del Canova, la ‘Maddalena Penitente’,” Arte lombarda 55/57 (1980): 390–391; and Erika Naginski, “Canova’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’: On Trauma’s Prehistory,” in Trauma and Visuality in Modernity, ed. Lisa Saltzman and Eric M. Rosenberg (Hanover: Dartmouth College Press, 2006), 67–68. 11 Quatremère de Quincy, “Sur M. Canova et les quatre ouvrages,” 1429.

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that distinguish him […]?”12 For Quatremère, although Canova’s painterly qualities were imprecise, nothing more than a “feeling,” they were nonetheless a positive attribute and did not negate the power of the sculptural medium. Rather, this painterliness was precisely the trait which made Canova’s work so powerful. It was the very heart of his style, imbuing his sculptures with softness and grace. Painterliness was also the key to his working practice. In a lengthy passage, Quatremère described Canova’s approach to sculpting the Penitent Magdalene in the same terms he may have used if the work had been a painting. For instance, he argued that there was no trace of mechanical imitation in Canova’s approach to the work. Quatremère disdained sculptures that were the result of “mathematically copying” the model, for in so doing, the artist risked wasting the “knowledge,” inventive “verve,” and “sentiment” which were due to the final piece.13 Canova did not fall into this trap. The final marble did not reveal Canova’s working process and its laborious stages of production, and there was no hint that he copied or mechanically replicated the work in the transition from clay model to marble block. Rather, Penitent Magdalene proceeded purely from the artist’s feeling. “The marble itself seemed improvised,” Quatremère wrote, “if it were possible to improvise statues in marble.”14 The result of Quatremère’s willful denial of Canova’s working process—for which it was well documented that the artist made small clay models and a plaster cast as prototypes for the final marble—was to align the seemingly improvised nature of Canova’s carving with

12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid.

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that of an artistic sketch15 (Fig. 5.3). Disengaged from the rote act of copying, born in the fury of invention and a fertile imagination, the final marble was the embodiment of an original, spontaneous act of creation. Canova’s improvisational approach was not limited to the final marble, however, but began with the original conception of the work, which Quatremère argued arose when the “naive idea of a penitent virgin in the desert seized his [Canova’s] imagination.” Quatremère was also quick to argue that the subject had not been commissioned, but rather, that Canova had seen “an interesting motif of expression, abandon and truth: in a few days, these became his model, and then the model was converted into marble.”16 Penitent Magdalene was thus the physical manifestation of sentiment and sensibility in stone. Indebted to neither antiquity, nor life models, the work was an “original” creation that stemmed from three forces: Mary Magdalene’s repentance, Canova’s artistic imagination, and, finally, his emotional sensibility and the way it was affected by the saint’s despair.17 Quatremère’s enthusiasm for Canova’s “sentiment” and “improvisation” conflated the two parts 15 For a sensitive analysis of the terracotta model in Bassano del Grappa, see C. D. Dickerson III and Emerson Bowyer, “Canova, l’argilla e Bassano del Grappa/Canova, Clay, and Bassano del Grappa,” in Antonio Canova: Atelier, ed. Chiara Casarin (Venice: Marsilio, 2019), esp. 75–80. 16 Ibid. 17 Quatremère was the most forceful defender of Penitent Magdalene’s “originality,” but other authors also found the piece “original.” See A. P., “Exposition des tableaux en 1808,” Collection de pièces sur les beaux-arts (1673–1808), dite Collection Deloynes, ed. Bibliothèque Nationale (France), vol. 44, no. 1144 (Paris: La Bibliothèque, 1980), 129; Quatremère de Quincy, “Sur M. Canova et les quatre ouvrages,” 1429; and Antoine-Chrysosthôme Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages; ou, mémoires historiques sur la vie et les travaux de célèbre artiste (Paris: A. Le Clere, 1834), 67–68.

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Fig. 5.3: Antonio Canova, Penitent Magdalene, 1793–1794. Clay, 22 × 19 cm. Museo Correr, Venice, Italy. © Photo Archive – Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia

of sculptural practice—invention and execution—rendering them a singular component. It also distanced the work from the doctrine of imitation; Penitent Magdalene’s creation was not rooted in mimesis or the observation of nature. Instead, it was rooted in a more Romantic notion of creation, one which “brought into being” an “inchoate and only partly formed” sensation.18 18 Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Ironically, Quatremère, one of the staunchest supporters of imitation and an avowed enemy of Romanticism, arguably became the first writer to align Canova’s works with a proto-Romantic sensibility. Quatremère’s insistence on Penitent Magdalene’s originality, however, was patently false. Press, 1989), 374. Erika Naginski also touches on this aspect of the work. Naginski, “Canova’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’,” 66.

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Exhibiting Antonio Canova

That is, it may well be true that Canova arrived at the subject matter with no prodding on the part of a patron, and that he felt a rush of emotion that inspired the act of creation, but it is equally true that the representation of Penitent Magdalene was a powerful and popular one in the fine arts. Although there were obviously no predecessors for the subject to be found in the antiquities being excavated in Rome, in the f ifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries Mary Magdalene was a popular subject for artists. Undoubtedly, the most famous sculptural representation was that of Donatello from 1454–1455 (Fig. 5.4). Composed of white poplar wood, the Magdalene stands in tattered clothing with her hands pressed together in prayer. The veins of the wood, rich cognac polychromy, and rugged texture dramatize her haggard and dirty state, while her limp locks merge seamlessly with her tattered clothing, rendering her desperation almost animalistic. So removed was Donatello’s work from the neoclassical conception of ideal beauty and grace that when Hermann Friedländer saw the sculpture in Florence in 1815, he found it “shocking to the sight. A miserable skeleton, emaciated as if it had been long mouldering in the grave, wrapped up in rags and her long hair, presents a horrid idea of a disgusting heretic, without giving any idea of repentance or the operation of grace.”19 Canova’s depiction of the Magdalene could not be further from the example Donatello had provided. The change in material alone starkly transforms the saint. The smoothness of marble, even tinted as it was, luminously contrasts with the cragged wooden sculpture. Likewise, the respective postures of the saint reflect a marked contrast in the conception of the work. While Donatello’s Magdalene stands and beseeches the Fig. 5.4: Donatello, The Penitent Magdalene, ca. 1453–1455. Wood with polychromy and gold, 181 × 51 × 45 cm. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Florence, Italy. Scala / Art Resource, NY

19 Herman [sic] Friedländer, Views in Italy, during a Journey in the Years 1815–1816 (London: Sir Richard Phillips, 1821), 42.

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Fig. 5.5: Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (detail), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev

viewer with her hands held in prayer, Canova’s Magdalene kneels and curves in on herself, burdened and isolated by the weight of her thoughts. She does not meet the beholder’s eye, nor does she plead for forgiveness, meditating instead on her own existence. Although she is ostensibly near the end of her life, Canova’s Magdalene is unblemished and youthful, in stark opposition to the hollowed skull that rests before her. Her eyes are swollen with tears, one of which tumbles down her cheek, and rests just above her half-opened lips (Fig. 5.5). Her thighs compressed, she lists slightly to the left, ready to collapse on the ground. Although her hair too is long and tangled, it hangs on a back which is all smooth and naked flesh (Fig. 5. 6). The Magdalene is barely covered by the cloth that

is held up by a rope knotted at her waist; it dips below her haunches in the rear and threatens to reveal her breasts completely. Her hands rest lightly on her thighs, and in her open palms she holds the bronze cross that was the source of so much controversy. As she contemplates her innermost thoughts, Canova’s Magdalene is a sensual and beautiful sight for the beholder. The sensuality exhibited by Canova’s Magdalene may bear no resemblance to Donatello’s sculpture, but it did recall many of the paintings that depicted the saint. In painting, the Magdalene was often represented as a forlorn beauty with a strong erotic charge. The most famous example, a work by Correggio, now lost, the Penitent Magdalene Reading (ca. 1518), was said to have been the model for all

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Fig. 5.6: Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (rear view), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev

Defining Modern Sculpture

future images of the penitent. But it was such a popular subject that numerous seventeenthand eighteenth-century painters depicted it. Sommariva himself, the collector who finally purchased Canova’s marble, owned at least four paintings on the theme. In many of them, Mary Magdalene is recumbent, weeping over the cross and skull, often in a semi-nude state. Yet even when the similarities between the paintings and Canova’s sculpture were superficial, numerous visitors felt Canova had taken the theme from an Old Master painting (even if they did not specify which one).20 The wealth of possible pictorial sources for Canova’s sculpture added to the association between the work of art and “painterliness.” This was not simply because of the subject matter of the work, however, but because representations of the penitent Magdalene—no matter what their form—were imbued with emotional intensity. Images of the repentant saint depicted her during the thirty-year period of atonement in which she wandered the wilderness in the south of France.21 Having abandoned all her worldly possessions, she was reduced to dirty rags and unkempt hair. She fasted, self-flagellated, and meditated upon Christ’s death—and perhaps her own—by contemplating the cross, the Bible, and the unguent with which she anointed Christ’s feet. Melancholy, despair, repentance (and sometimes desire) were all manifested in the figure of the saint. Often accompanied by a skull, she was a vivid call for viewers to 20 For one example, see T. Medwin, “Canova. Leaves from the Autobiography of an Amateur,” Fraser’s Magazine for Town and Country XX.CXVII (September 1839): 372–373. 21 For more on the traditional iconography associated with Mary Magdalene’s atonement, see Franco Mormando, “Teaching the Faithful to Fly: Mary Magdalene and Peter in Baroque Italy,” in Saints & Sinners: Caravaggio & the Baroque Image, ed. Franco Mormando (Chestnut Hill, MA: McMullen Museum of Art, 1999), 116–120.

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contemplate their faith and their own mortality; her atonement was to be a model for their own.22

Expression and the Art of Sculpture Like his predecessors, Canova had successfully captured Magdalene’s wretched emotional state, and reviews of the work were awash with descriptions of the sculpture’s “expression,” which was thematized in her melancholic form. 23 Quatremère, for instance, suggested that everyone would recognize the “touching expression in her pose […] an admirable truthfulness in her arms, legs, feet, a profound affection, a religious pain in her face which is no longer marble and which cries.”24 Vivant Denon likewise praised the pleasing sensation produced on viewers as a result of “the workmanship of the marble, the beautiful expression of the head, and the moving abandonment of the pose.”25 For Victorin Fabrin, “the head [was] a masterpiece of beauty, expression and grace,” while A. P. thought her “a piece full of

22 For the impact images of Penitent Magdalene had on viewers, see Pamela M. Jones, “The Power of Images: Paintings and Viewers in Caravaggio’s Italy,” in Saints & Sinners: Caravaggio & the Baroque Image, ed. Franco Mormando (Chestnut Hill, MA: McMullen Museum of Art, 1999), 38–41. 23 The repeated use of the term “expression” has also been noted by Francesca Lui and Erika Naginski. See Francesca Lui, “Il caso della Maddalena del Canova a Parigi: Riflessi iconografici e letterari in età romantica,” in Rappresentazioni del sacro nel romanticismo Francese, ed. Annarosa Poli (Moncalieri: Centro interuniversitario di ricerche sul “viaggio in Italia,” 2002), 360, and Naginski, “Canova’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’,” 68. 24 Quatremère de Quincy, “Sur M. Canova et les quatre ouvrages,” 1429. 25 As cited in Gérard Hubert, Les sculpteurs italiens en France sous la Révolution, l’Empire et la Restauration, 1790–1830 (Paris: E. de Boccard, 1964), 44.

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expression.”26 Q. Z. spoke of “the penetrating expression of the head,” and Sommariva himself noted that “the work surpassed the antique, above all for her expression of moral pain.”27 Even M. B., who otherwise lambasted Canova for his use of the bronze cross and the Magdalene’s lack of correct proportions, grudgingly admitted that “the exaggerated length of her palms might be used here as a mode of expression.”28 The repeated use of the term “expression” in Parisian circles carried a significant nationalist undercurrent. On the one hand, use of the phrase clearly signaled the work’s success. “Expression” had its roots in sixteenth-century Italian theory, when it had been used to describe an artist’s capacity to endow a work of art—primarily painting—with strong emotional valences.29 It was in seventeenth-century French circles, however, particularly that of Charles Le Brun, that the word took on the meanings for which it is best known.30 By the early nineteenth century, expression reappears repeatedly in French circles as an example of that which distinguishes painting from sculpture and modern works from ancient ones. More importantly, however, the emphasis on expression and expressivity signals the way eighteenth-century ideas of 26 Victorin Fabre, “Salon de Peinture,” 603; and A. P., “Exposition des tableaux en 1808,” 129, respectively. 27 Q. Z., “Exposition des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture et gravure des artistes vivants,” Collection de pièces sur les beaux-arts (1673–1808), dite Collection Deloynes, ed. Bibliothèque Nationale (France), vol. 44, no. 1146 (Paris: La Bibliothèque, 1980), 419; and Sommariva, cited in Mazzocca, “G. B. Sommariva o il Borghese Mecenate,” 246, respectively. 28 M. B., “Beaux-arts. Salon de 1808,” 2. 29 For a general discussion of expression, see Richard Shiff, “Expression: Natural, Personal, Pictorial,” in A Companion to Art Theory, ed. Paul Smith and Carolyn Wilde (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002), 159–172. 30 Naginski, “Canova’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’,” 68.

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interiority, subjectivity, and the self had been absorbed into the rhetoric of art criticism in early-nineteenth-century France. Throughout the eighteenth century, the self was increasingly identified and located within the body and the psyche, giving new resonance to the “inner voice” that was unique to each modern individual. This “expressivist turn,” as Charles Taylor has called it, privileged emotion, expression, sentiment, and the imagination, as one searched for one’s “inner truth.”31 Expression was associated with the very modern understanding of man as a unique individual. Unlike other critical terms that were associated with Canova’s work and sculpture in general, expression had a significantly broader meaning that extended far beyond the bounds of art criticism. In addition, since expression was a pivotal aspect of modern man, it also emerged as a fundamental quality inherent to French, Romantic, modern art. As several authors have pointed out, the expressive qualities of Canova’s Penitent Magdalene allowed the work to be coopted by French critics as an example of protoRomantic sculpture.32 The sculpture’s eroticism, “painterliness,” and apparent originality, given the absence of an ancient model, enhanced this association. Penitent Magdalene’s Christian sentiment also corresponded fully with the religious sentiment of many Romantic works of art. Christopher Johns has situated the sculpture’s popularity in relation to the Catholic revival in France and Erica Naginski has argued that the saint exemplified France’s collective penitence for the 31 See Taylor, Sources of the Self, esp. chapter 21, ‘The Expressivist Turn,’ 368–390. 32 See Boggero, “Una rilettura critica del Canova,” 386–392; Fernando Mazzocca, “Canova e la svolta romantica: Appunti sulla Maddalena Penitente,” ’800 Italiano (March 1992): 4–11; and Lui, “Il Caso della Maddalena del Canova a Parigi,” 386–392.

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Terror and its many deaths.33 The resurgence of Catholic dogma manifested itself in Christian treatises such as René du Chateaubriand’s The Genius of Christianity (1802) and works of art in the Salon, all of which undoubtedly played a role in the work’s popularity. Yet it was not just fervent Catholic feeling or the sculpture’s Catholic subject that encouraged the public’s warm reaction to the Penitent Magdalene. Nor was it the mere form of the sculpture that fit the tenets of Romanticism so well. Rather, I argue, it was her solitary prayer, her individual devotion to God, that made her appealing. Ultimately, the sculpture’s appeal to the modern subjective sense of self gave it such compelling resonance in the early nineteenth century. Historians who study the modern notion of selfhood often argue that the Protestant Reformation contributed to the affirmation of “ordinary life” and personal expression, a broad historical change that affected all Europeans, Protestant or not. By rejecting the notion that a mediator was required to bring an individual closer to God, the believer’s personal commitment and expression were given a privileged position.34 If we consider Canova’s Magdalene in this light, the saint’s repentance occurs through meditation on the nature of physical and spiritual life. This was a private penance, as opposed to a public service. Through her very inwardness, and her inner turning gaze, Magdalene connects directly to the divine. The subject of the Magdalene was provoked by, and further provokes, a belief in private emotional communication—emotional communication that occurred between individuals. 33 Christopher M. S. Johns, “Erotic Spirituality and the Catholic Revival in Napoleonic Paris: The Curious History of Antonio Canova’s Penitent Magdalene,” Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture 42 (2013): 1–20; and Naginski, “Canova’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’,” 55 and 72–74. 34 Taylor, Sources of the Self, 211–218.

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The relationship forged between Mary Magdalene and God was ref lected in the relationship created between the Magdalene and the beholder. Spectator and saint were to experience the same remorse; the act of viewing was meant to generate behavior in the beholder that mimicked that of the penitent saint herself. The success of Penitent Magdalene depended on the authenticity of the Magdalene’s expression of repentance and the subsequent sympathy it aroused in the viewer. Her representation was the pretext for the sympathetic projection of the beholder. Penitent Magdalene thus affected and shaped the beholder’s emotional response so that he too could participate in the Romantic ethos of “becoming”; this gave the work its powerful charge.35 Although in the seventeenth century Mary Magdalene’s expressivity had been intended to arouse piety in the viewer, by the early nineteenth century, however, religious devotion was not on the forefront of viewers’ minds. Despite all the attention that the expression of Canova’s Magdalene received, none of the Salon critics were prompted to spiritual self-reflection. They either responded with sympathy for the saint’s plight or considered her expression from an aesthetic point of view—or both. No doubt this was due, in part, to the secular nature of the work’s display in the Salon, and not in a church, as Quatremère had originally hoped. The nature of the Salon incited aesthetic reactions to works of art, whatever their subject matter, religious or otherwise. In addition, the Salon’s occurrence in the Musée Napoléon augmented 35 For Karl Wilhelm Friedrich von Schlegel’s notions on Romantic poetry as a poetic form that is not fixed, but rather is still in the process of “becoming, see his “Fragments” in J. Schulte-Sasse et al., ed. and trans., Theory as Practice: A Critical Anthology of Early German Romantic Writings (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997).

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the aestheticization of these works of art. After all, much of the project of the Musée Napoléon was the desacralization of art objects, composed as it was of masterpieces seized from various European nations; many were altarpieces which lost their original devotional function. At the same time, in the 1808 Salon Penitent Magdalene found itself among numerous works of art that had religious themes which united beauty and spirituality in a fundamentally modern manner, one which had no devotional purpose. In 1808, critics contemplating Penitent Magdalene linked their interest in the sculpture’s expression with larger aesthetic issues, rather than personal religious concerns. Once again, the question of medium specificity was raised. M. B., for instance, pondered the question at length. Even though he found Canova’s sculpture noble and felt the “strong and well-found” expression “a merit” of the work, he could not refrain from asking: Was this type of expression appropriate for a work of sculpture? Sculpture, he wrote: in general […] rarely lends itself to the expression of extreme emotional states, in particular those that manifest themselves in a real disorder of the body. The Saint’s corporeal movement is admirable. But this pain, so touching and well-expressed, the pose of this f igure that is collapsed upon herself with such truthfulness—are these really proper subjects for an art form especially dedicated to the imitation of beautiful forms? I think not.36

For M. B., Canova’s attempt to render Magdalene’s desperation breached the boundaries of correctness by threatening to ruin her beauty— beauty that should have been the real subject of the sculpture. Beauty and commitment to truthfulness, or, the vrai, had the potential to be at odds with one another if the “truth” that 36 M. B., “Beaux-arts. Salon de 1808,” 2–3.

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the artist wanted to depict was neither idealized nor beautiful. Yet, despite this tension, the pain Canova captured and his ability “to render the softness of skin” gave “each part of his works a particular interest that caught the eye of the spectator.”37 Another author too could not help noticing that Canova seemed to have proved that “expression carried to its greatest extreme can produce on the spectator a very great impression, without the help of correct forms or of anything that constitutes to our mind a beautiful work of sculpture.” Canova’s work, after all, lacked “correct forms […], happy effects of line, or in fact anything characterizing a Greek style,” yet, it was still the work that “made the greatest impression—without a doubt” on viewers.38 Only one respondent—an Italian, Saverio Scrofani—felt that Canova had not betrayed his medium. Scrofani argued that in both painting and sculpture, composition and expression could not be distinguished from the action of the work.39 Canova, he felt, was a master at finding the proper action that fully captured the sculpture’s expression. 40 Canova’s works, far from revealing a def iciency in the sculptural medium, instead could be used to instruct painters whose talents were inferior 37 Ibid. 38 Transcribed in “Salon de 1808. Journal de l’architecture, des arts libéraux et mécaniques, des sciences et de l’industrie,” Collection de pièces sur les beaux-arts (1673–1808), dite Collection Deloynes, ed. Bibliothèque Nationale (France), vol. 45, no. 1157 (Paris: La Bibliothèque, 1980), 715–716. 39 Saverio Scrofani, Al signor cavaliere Ennio Quirino Visconti, membro della Legion d’onore e dell’istituto di Francia, lettere di Saverio Scrofani, Siciliano, corrispon­ dente della classe di storia del medesimo istituto, sopra alcuni quadri della Galleria Giustiniani ed una statua del cavaliere Antonio Canova esposta nel Museo Napolione l’anno 1808 (Paris: Torchi di Dondey-Dupre, 1809), 43. 40 Ibid., 45.

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to his own. 41 As for the Penitent Magdalene, it was precisely the power of Magdalene’s expression that contributed the most to her beauty and the spectator’s interest. Scrofani too was astonished by the saint’s expression, particularly her “languid eyes, the extremities of her f ingers and a certain movement dispersed through her body.”42 These attributes captured the liminal moment “between life and death” which “increased the anxiety and consequently the pious delight of the spectator.”43 These very qualities, in combination with the fundamentally Christian nature of the work, allowed Canova’s work to surpass the sculpture of the ancients. Magdalene’s repentance for her sins and the hope of her salvation were the qualities that most distinguished her from Niobe and Laocoön, against whom the spectator was sure the anger of the gods would never cease. 44 Penitent Magdalene therefore incited provocative debate on the role of expression in the sculptural medium. Although by the nineteenth century Penitent Magdalene rarely commanded the devotional engagement of its spectators, the sculpture’s powerful expression did garner viewers’ interest in broader aesthetic issues. Yet, even though critics were divided as to the proper role expression should have in sculpture, they all agreed it had a vivid impact on viewers. Expression was one of the few elements of art that was truly universal. That is, appreciating and understanding a work’s expression did not depend on the beholder’s connoisseurship skills—or lack thereof. As Q. Z. wrote, although “the distribution of groups, the combination of lines, the art of effects […] demand the knowledge of art in order to be appreciated,

[…] expression is available to everyone; everyone may judge the truth, grace and ease of a pose with a little attention.”45 Expression therefore transcended connoisseurship. The interest in expression consistently reflected by writers and theoreticians of art in France signaled the development of a modern path of art history and art appreciation. In their consideration of the way expression affected spectators, they established a universal model for the appreciation of works of art. This became one of the key traits of modern art and cemented the legacy that French art would have in the twentieth century. The 1808 Salon was a seminal moment when expression took hold in the critical vocabulary. It was, however, only a beginning. The impact of Magdalene’s expression was so powerful that even after the close of the Salon commentary on the work did not cease. The work’s placement in the home of Giambattista Sommariva heightened spectators’ reactions to the saint’s expression, strengthening the role she played in the defining modern sculpture in France.

41 42 43 44

45 Q. Z., “Beaux-arts. Expositions des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture et gravure des artistes vivans. No. 1er. Apperçu général,” Gazette de France 287 (Oct. 15, 1808): 1146.

Ibid., 44, footnote 1. Ibid., 44. Ibid., 44. Ibid., 45–46.

Collecting as Expression of the Self If Canova’s Penitent Magdalene had not been owned by one of the most acquisitive and selfpromoting collectors of the period perhaps the work would have been forgotten quickly by Parisians. But the voraciousness with which Sommariva amassed his art collection was rivaled only by the f ierceness with which he used the fine arts to promote himself. In addition to purchasing Old Master paintings, Sommariva commissioned a broad range of

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Fig. 5.7: Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, Portrait of Gian-Battista Sommariva, ca. 1815. Oil on canvas, 210 × 156 cm. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan, Italy. © DeA Picture Library / Art Resource, NY

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work from contemporary French and Italian artists. Spread among five different residences in Italy and France, the bulk of his collection was located in his townhouse in Paris, where he resided from 1805 until 1819, and the Villa Sommariva on Lake Como, where he spent most of his time after 1819. Once the 1808 Salon closed, he reclaimed Penitent Magdalene and placed the sculpture on display in his Parisian townhouse, which was open to the public every Friday afternoon; legions of visitors and tourists continued to admire the work there. 46 Sommariva’s self-image was so bound up with his status as a collector of Canova’s works that he publicly broadcast his connection to the sculptor in several portraits he commissioned, in which he is displayed proudly surrounded by Canova’s statues or by stand-ins for Canova himself. In Pierre-Paul Prud’hon’s portrait from 1815, Sommariva’s ownership of his collection is made overt by the way in which he is seated, at ease, in the park, possibly the garden of the Villa Sommariva, surrounded by two of his esteemed sculptures by Canova, Palamedes and Terpsichore (Fig. 5.7). Depicted as a wealthy man at leisure, Sommariva holds a book in his hand, as if he has just stopped reading. While Palamedes has been cut off in part by the painting’s framing edge, Terpsichore takes center stage, and Sommariva rests his hand easily, yet proprietarily, along her toes. On another occasion, Sommariva publicized his connection to Canova obliquely, by commissioning a painting from Girodet intended as an homage to the sculptor and widely understood

46 See Francis Haskell, “An Italian Patron of French Neo-Classic Art,” in Past and Present in Art and Taste: Selected Essays (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1987), 46–64, and Francis Haskell, “More about Sommariva,” The Burlington Magazine 114.835 (Oct. 1972): 691–695.

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as such by the Parisian press. 47 The painter selected the subject of Pygmalion and Galatea (1813–1819)48 (Fig. 5.8). The story, based on Ovid’s Metamorphoses, had been more recently popularized in a 1762 melodrama by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. 49 In Girodet’s painting, Pygmalion stands astonished before the beautiful Galatea, whose alabaster surface transforms into real flesh. Set in the distant past, a temple to the gods looms in the background, while a statue of Venus, with incense and offerings burning at her feet, presides in an alcove nearby. Soft pink hues diffuse over the painting’s surface and the mystical light behind Galatea alerts us to her magical transformation. Pygmalion, a handsome youth wearing a flowered garland on his crown, strives to touch his creation-turnedflesh. Impatient, he reaches out, fingers prepared to pinch her flesh, foot already firmly planted on her pedestal. Galatea, on the other hand, revels in her newly corporeal state. She touches her breast, as if in awe of the beating of her heart. Eyes downcast, she has not yet set eyes on her creator, but a small cupid that floats between them speaks to the imminent union between artist and artwork, lover and beloved. Exhibited at the 1819 Salon, the work created an enormous stir. In part, this was due to the way that Girodet’s “Classical” painting was compared to Théodore Géricault’s “Romantic” Raft of the Medusa, also exhibited that same

47 R. [Charles Robert?], “Beaux-arts. Salon de 1819. Exposition des ouvrages de peinture et de sculpture au Musée-Royale des beaux-arts,” Annuaire historique universel, pour 1819 (1820): 741–742. 48 See Chiara Savettieri, “‘Il avait retrouvé le secret de Pygmalion’: Girodet, Canova e l’illusione della vita,” Studiolo 2 (Dec. 2003): 14–42. 49 Horace Coignet and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Pygmalion: Scène lyrique, ed. Jacqueline Waeber (Geneva: Editions Université-Conservatoire de musique, 1997).

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Fig. 5.8: Anne-Louis Girodet-Trioson, Pygmalion and Galatée, 1819. Oil on canvas, 253 × 202 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY

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year.50 It is true, that in the face of a comparison with Géricault’s Raft, Girodet’s painting seems remarkably conservative and florid. Yet, if we consider the work with both Sommariva’s patronage and with Canova’s sculptural practice in mind, particularly in light of the comments raised by Penitent Magdalene, the painting adroitly captures the “becoming” referred to by Quatremère de Quincy in his description of Canova’s creation of the Magdalene. That is, not only is Girodet’s painting a nod to Canova’s talent for capturing the semblance of flesh in stone, but the painting encapsulates the idea of sculptural creation as a Romantic one. In Romantic theory, creation was the direct result of the artist’s expression of interior emotions—through, above all, his imagination and the force of love. In much of the criticism of Girodet’s work, writers focused on the fact that Girodet had not depicted Pygmalion in the sculptor’s studio, in sharp contradistinction to the way Rousseau had portrayed the scene. For some writers, the nebulous space of the painting—in front of a temple, in a portico—was profoundly disquieting. Landon was irritated that nothing signified Pygmalion’s status as the “author” of the statue, for there was nothing to indicate the artist’s studio, nothing which signified a space of creation.51 His sentiment was echoed by “R.” in the Annuaire historique universel, and “P. V.” who hesitated in his description of the work—was the scene in Pygmalion’s studio, or a temple to Venus?52 Étienne-Jean Delecluze, writing as “E. J. D.” in the Lycée 50 James Rubin, “Delacroix and Romanticism,” in The Cambridge Companion to Delacroix, ed. Beth Segal Wright (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 31–32. 51 Charles-Paul Landon, “Salon de 1819, ” Annales du musée et de l’école moderne des beaux-arts, 2 vols. (Paris: Imprimerie Royale, 1819), vol. 2, 10. 52 R., “Beaux-Arts. Salon de 1819,” 742; and P. V., letter to Jacques-Louis David, November 22, 1819, in Lettres

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français, compared Girodet’s depiction directly to Rousseau’s play, which not only stressed, but established the identity of Pygmalion as an artist. Girodet, on the contrary, by dispensing with sculptural tools, “spiritualized” his subject; the “miracle” of life was attributed “to the power of love.”53 For Count Arthur O’Mahony, this was precisely the beauty of Girodet’s painting. Girodet’s “banishment” of any signs of the workshop also banished “all material thought from a heavenly scene.”54 Girodet’s Pygmalion speaks to the Romantic impulse of artistic creation via two different paths, and, in so doing, aligns itself precisely with the qualities that were most potent in Canova’s Magdalene. By eliminating the space of the artist’s studio and his tools, Girodet removes any signs that might identify the creation of sculpture as a prosaic and manual craft. The painting spoke strongly of the generative power of the artistic imagination, which did not need to rely on an imitative model of creation. At the same time, Girodet’s imagining of the act of animation, of the act of a soul coming into being, triggered an equally creative response in viewers. Many beholders, in fact, were attuned to their own potential as creators after seeing the painting. E. F. A. M. Miel, for instance, who had not even seen the work in 1817, contemplated what Girodet’s canvas might look like. He did so by recalling the biography of Correggio, who was overwhelmed after seeing the frescoes of Raphael. “If,” Miel wrote, “my imaginary painting approached à David, sur le Salon de 1819 par quelques élèves de son école (Paris: Pillet Ainge, 1819), 179, respectively. 53 E. J. D. [Étienne-Jean Delécluze], “Beaux arts. Huitième lettre au rédacteur du lycée français, sur l’exposition des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, etc. des artistes vivans,” Lycée français, ou mélanges de littérature et de critique (Paris: Bechet Aîné, 1819): vol. 2, 241–242. 54 Le Comte O’Mahony, “Exposition des tableaux. (IVe Article.) Pygmalion et Galatée, par M. Girodet,” Le conservateur 5 (1819): 275.

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his [Girodet’s] canvas even a bit, would I seem reckless to cry out with Correggio, in the thrill of my satisfaction, I too am a painter?”55 Auguste Hilarion de Kératry was so moved by Girodet’s work that he felt acutely conscious of the “impotence of his pen”; he felt he must try to create “a painting with words.”56 Girodet’s work appealed to the viewers’ understanding of themselves as expressive beings, in a dual sense. They recognized the impact the work wrought on their own emotional states, which in turn held the potential to transform them into creative beings—into artists, like Girodet himself. Pygmalion also speaks to the romantic impulse of the artist through the theme of love. Numerous critics commented on love as the force that animated Galatea. These writers were particularly concerned with the way intense affection and passion could create a bond between individuals. The relationship between Pygmalion and Galatea was the most intimate that could exist. De Kératry, for instance, noted that this was a fundamentally modern union. In his discussion of the painting, he even compared ancient marriages meant to guarantee genealogical succession to modern ones, which were based on mutual affection, the “intimacy between two beings.”57 Yet another writer, the Catholic apologist Auguste Nicolas, used Girodet’s painting to elucidate the concept of the Trinity. Leaving aside the religious component of his analogy, Nicolas’ description could be a manifesto of modern individuality. Not only did Girodet capture the “psychological thought” that underlies the story, but the painting also depicts 55 E. F. A. M. Miel, Essai sur le Salon de 1817, ou examen critique des principaux ouvrages dont l’exposition se compose (Paris: Delaunay, 1817), 241. 56 Auguste Hilarion de Kératry, Annuaire de l’école française de peinture ou lettres sur le Salon de 1819 (Paris: Maradan, 1820), 239–240. 57 De Kératry, Annuaire de l’école française, 233–235.

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a trinity—the soul of the artist, his conception, realized in the statue, and, finally, love. Yet even within this trinity, there unity is to be found, for “what is the statue, if not his [the artist’s] soul expressed, and an emanation of his intellectual substance? What is the love that unites them, if it is not still this soul folding its thought upon itself, and having it, in some way, re-enter in the substance of his genius?”58 In this remarkable passage, Nicolas touches on the core ideas that lie behind the early-nineteenth-century understanding of modern subjectivity, and, thus, the ethos of Romanticism. The trinity reflects both the uniqueness of the individual and his inner life. He strives for independence, even as he yearns for unity and collectivity with nature and his fellow man. Creation is also the spontaneous production of a powerful imagination that emanates from the inner depths of the individual, and which in turn then acts upon him. Read in light of Nicolas’ text, the relationship between Pygmalion and Galatea is not just one of sculptor and creation, lover and beloved, but a constant “becoming,” emanating and doubling back in a closed circuit where subject and object ceaselessly impact each other and become one. Was this not precisely the impact that Canova’s Penitent Magdalene had on viewers? Pygmalion and Galatea, despite its “classical” form, embodied very modern notions of the individual, his sense of self, and his role in artistic creation. At the same time, however, perhaps no other painting better captured Sommariva’s own relationship to the act of collecting. What is the act of collecting, if not the desire for an object, a need to possess it? Is a collection not also a continual process of becoming, since a collection, by definition, can never be complete? Is not the 58 Auguste Nicolas, Études philosophiques sur le Christianisme, 3rd ed., 4 vols. (Bruxelles: M. Vanderborght, 1849), vol. 2, 72.

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Fig. 5.9: François-Louis Dejuinne, Girodet painting “Pygmalion and Galatea”, 1821. Oil on canvas, 65 × 54.5 cm. Musée Girodet, Montargis, France. © F. Lauginie / Musée Girodet, Montargis

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collector, in this sense, an artist who oversees the making of the collection? In so doing, does a collector not also create his own sense of self? Sommariva’s desire to be an agent of creation was palpable. In a stunning moment of self-identification as patron and collector, Sommariva commissioned Girodet Painting “Pygmalion and Galatea” from François-Louis Dejuinne (1784–1844), which was shown at the 1822 Salon59 (Fig. 5.9). Dejuinne’s painting, like Pygmalion itself, also manifests the concept of “making.” Sommariva is seated, with Dejuinne standing by his side, watching Girodet in the act of painting Pygmalion. Standing on a small step stool, the artist has paused between strokes, brush suspended in midair. A strong artificial light illuminates the canvas, contrasting not only with the moonlit sky visible through the studio window but also with Girodet’s own famous representation of moonlight in a small répétition of The Sleep of Endymion (1791), which hangs on the studio wall. Most remarkable, however, is the doubling that occurs in the painting—between moonlit sky and moonlit painting, between the cast of the Venus de’Medici and the female model crouched and dressing herself in the far corner, between the gaze of Pygmalion and Galatea, and that of Sommariva and Girodet himself. It is this last pairing which is the most powerful, for Sommariva and Girodet parallel Pygmalion and Galatea in their postures. Sommariva clutches his hat, as Pygmalion grasps his cloak; Girodet stands atop his stool, as Galatea rests on her pedestal. The two look at one another, patron and artist reciprocating a mutual gaze, but it is Sommariva here who takes on the role of ultimate creator, having birthed not only Girodet’s painting, but also Dejuinne’s. 59 Richard Dagorne, “Le Portrait de Girodet peignant ‘Pygmalion et Galatée’ de François-Louis Dejuinne trouve sa place à Montargis,” La revue du Louvre et des Musées de France 57.2 (April 2007): 17–19.

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Since Pygmalion himself was understood as an homage to Canova, Sommariva symbolically asserts his connection to the sculptor as well. Dejuinne’s painting inscribed Sommariva’s role as collector and patron on multiple levels and asserted that his role was not only as important as the artists he commissioned, but perhaps even more so. Even more remarkably, Sommariva’s impulse towards creative agency did not stop with the large-scale paintings he commissioned. He further performed the ownership of his collection through a relentless project of replication and dissemination. In addition, for instance, to the five original marble sculptures he owned made by Canova himself, Sommariva also commissioned a marble copy and a plaster cast of the Magdalene and Terpsichore, respectively, for the Villa Sommariva, duplicating the two most well-known pieces in his collection. At the same time, he had much of his collection—sculptures and paintings alike—replicated in miniature. From 1810 to 1826, for instance, Sommariva commissioned more than a hundred miniature enamel copies of paintings in his collection. These included miniatures after Old Master paintings as well as works by modern artists, such as Adèle Chavassieu d’Haudebert’s Portrait of Sommariva (after Prud’hon) and Girodet Painting “Pygmalion and Galatea” (after Dejuinne) and Henri l’Évêque’s Pygmalion and Galatea (after Girodet), shown here in situ at the Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan (Figs. 5.10). Both paintings and sculptures in Sommariva’s collection were also transformed on occasion into miniature cameos and intaglios.60 Although many of these are now lost, the examples that 60 See Lucia Pirzio Biroli Stefanelli, “‘Avea il Marchese Sommariva … una sua favorita idea,’ I: Opere di incisori romani documentate nella Collezione Paoletti,” Bollettino dei Musei Comunali di Roma 9 (1995): 104–116; Lucia Pirzio Biroli Stefanelli, “‘Avea il Marchese Sommariva una sua

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Fig. 5.10: Enamels commissioned by Sommariva of paintings in his collection, in situ at the Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy, 2006–2008. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan, Italy; on deposit at Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy

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Fig. 5.11: Giovanni Beltrami, The Death of Abel, after Michel Martin Drölling fils, 1819. Engraved cornelian, oval frame in gilt bronze, 5 × 3.7 cm, with the frame, 9.8 × 8.8 cm. Signed and dated, Beltrami INC. 1819 / Drolling Fils Pinx / Sommariva possiede. Courtesy of Walter Padovani, Milan, Italy

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Fig. 5.12: Giovanni Beltrami, The Last Kiss of Romeo and Juliet, after Francesco Hayez, 1824. Rock crystal, 12.7 × 0.7 × 9.2 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Purchase, The Isaacson-Draper Foundation Gift, 2016

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Fig. 5.13: Bartolomeo et Pietro Paoletti, Museo di S. E. il sig. cont. Sommariva, [1822–1834]. Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, collections Jacques Doucet, Ms 808, n. 1–19. Photo credit: Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Paris, France

are known to us are stunning. The intaglio in cornelian by Giovanni Beltrami of the painting The Death of Abel (1817) by Michel Martin Drölling fils (1786–1851) is a luminous piece of craftsmanship that announces its status as the reproduction of a painting by the inclusion of the framing edge (Fig. 5.11). Equally breathtaking is the Metropolitan’s rock crystal intaglio by Beltrami after Francesco Hayez’s The Last Kiss of Romeo and Juliet (Fig. 5.12).

favorita idea …’, II: Le incisioni di Giovanni Beltrami,” Bollettino dei Musei Comunali di Roma 11 (1997): 111–131.

Other gems are known to us only because they were further reproduced as miniature plaster casts (Fig. 5.13). Examples include not only casts after Beltrami’s cameo of Drölling’s The Death of Abel, but also casts after gems, now lost, that reproduced Prud’hon’s Portrait of Sommariva and Jacques-Louis David’s Cupid and Psyche, to name only two examples (Fig. 5.14). Needless to say, since they were the pride of Sommariva’s collection, Canova’s works were also among those reproduced as cameos and intaglios. Most of these, too, are known to us only through casts, many of which were sold in sets to tourists, or their glass molds (Figs. 5.15 and 5.16).

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Fig. 5.14: Plaster cast after Giovanni Beltrami’s cameo after Pierre-Paul Prud’hon’s Portrait of Count Sommariva in His Villa in Tremezzo. Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, collections Jacques Doucet, Ms 808, no. 1 Photo credit: Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Paris, France

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Fig. 5.15: Francesco Carnesecchi, Impressions of Intaglios after the Statuary of Canova, ca. 1822–1844. Plaster, paper, and leather, 25.4 × 17.1 × 5.6 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Joseph D. Ryle, 1992

At the time, these cameos and intaglios were celebrated for their beauty. Viewers recognized the difficulty of transforming three-dimensional works of art into two-dimensional reliefs—not to mention the fact that gem-makers had to replicate works by the man who was considered the greatest sculptor of the time. It was common for aristocrats to exchange portrait miniatures as tokens of affection. It was also not unheard of to replicate important works of art in miniature. Since antiquity artists had replicated famous sculptures as cameos, while

miniature enamels reproducing paintings and prints were in vogue in the Renaissance. What is highly unusual about Sommariva’s miniatures, however, is his relentless reproduction and miniaturization of so many of the works in his collection, and how he chose to have those works replicated in more than one medium. Sommariva was thus repeatedly described as “the” patron of the arts for the modern era. He positioned himself in a nearly godlike relationship to the arts of the early nineteenth century.

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Fig. 5.16: Plaster cast after Giuseppe Girometti’s cameo after Canova’s Penitent Magdalene. Paoletti impronte [realia], Roma S. Paoletti … di studio in Via della Croce, 86, [ca. 1865?], plaster. Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Fund

He was patron, creator, supporter, disseminator, consumer, and admirer in one. Sommariva’s self-image was bound up so thoroughly with his status as a collector, particularly as a collector of Canova’s works, that it transformed both his personal adornment and the way he identified himself. He transformed a cameo of Canova’s portrait into a ring, which he

“always” wore, establishing an intimate rapport between the two men.61 This rapport was heightened by Sommariva’s personification of Canova’s Terpsichore (Fig. 5.17). He repeatedly referred to this work as “his bride,” which made Canova his 61 Cited in Mazzocca, “G. B. Sommariva o il borghese mecenate,” 145.

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“father-in-law.”62 Sommariva kept the statue in his bedroom at Paris, at the foot of his bed, where he claimed it was better situated than in the Louvre itself.63 These sexual metaphors speak to the intimacy and private connection Sommariva felt to the artist and his works of art. Sommariva perceived himself to be, quite literally, wedded to his collection. In this light, Girodet’s selection of the theme of Pygmalion takes on quite a new meaning. Sommariva’s placement of Terpsichore in the most intimate position in his home also signals his participation in the larger culture of performance and neoclassical exhibition techniques. In his homes, he displayed Canova’s works against velvet curtains and surrounded by mirrors, stressing the particularities of their display. Terpsichore, Palamedes, and Penitent Magdalene, for instance, were displayed with mirrors behind them, to afford viewers a complete view of each work. Yet each work also was displayed carefully according to the subject of the sculpture and the personal resonance the piece had for Sommariva. Terpsichore may have been his “bride,” but Penitent Magdalene was the work which best reflected Sommariva himself. It was, after all, the work with which Sommariva established himself as a collector of Canova’s works in Paris and with which, one might argue, he erased his past and created a new identity for himself. Visitors who met the count, for instance, described him as a man who had moved to France to create himself anew—not unlike the way Mary Magdalene moved to France and renounced her own past.64

Fig. 5.17: Antonio Canova, Terpsichore, 1816. Marble, 177.5 × 78.1 × 61 cm. Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund

62 For Sommariva’s references to Canova as his fatherin-law and Terpsichore as his bride, see ibid., 253, 255, 256, 261–265, respectively. 63 Ibid., 262–263. 64 Auguste François Fauveau Frénilly, Recollections of Baron de Frénilly, trans. Frederic Lees, ed. Arthur Chuquet (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1909), 199.

Defining Modern Sculpture

Magdalene reinvented herself through faith and religion, Sommariva did so through the strength of his collection. His was a modern reinvention, achieved through the personalization of his collection and the individualization of aesthetic experience. The chapel-like space which Sommariva created for Magdalene attracted visitors who could not help but reflect on Sommariva’s character and his collection as much as their own piety. Once again, it was Magdalene’s expression that drew their attention, as they contemplated their emotional response to the sculpture as well as her place in the history of art.

Sentiment, Interiority, and Universality In January 1809, Sommariva returned Penitent Magdalene to his townhouse on the Rue Basse des Remparts, where the particulars of its display heightened viewers’ attention to the work’s expression. Acknowledging the sculpture’s religious subject, Sommariva created a chapel-like space that isolated the Magdalene and enhanced her religious and aesthetic aura. The quasi-religious aspect of the display created a new theater of reception for the work, which, in turn, prompted deep empathy for the figure of Magdalene on behalf of viewers. Yet despite the religious aura created by the chapel, viewers were fully aware of the secular space of Sommariva’s collection. Comments vacillated between their appreciation of the saint’s religious piety and intense awareness of her eroticism, as well as Canova’s attention to her expression, the sculptural medium, and Sommariva’s role as a collector. In the context of Sommariva’s display, the statue was firmly established as a work of art that could appeal universally to viewers by tapping into their innermost sentiments. Sommariva himself was delighted with the “tone and rich simplicity of the space” that he

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created for the Magdalene, and for which he “consulted people of the highest taste to make sure nothing was lacking.”65 He gloated to Canova that “despite the fact that she [Magdalene] was publicly exhibited for more than two months, […] every day someone comes to see [the work] and everyone finds that the way I have lodged her accords perfectly with the subject and as much as possible with the merit of the work. It will suffice to tell you that everyone agrees that they have never seen her look more beautiful.”66 Sommariva’s choice of words—his claim that he has “lodged” the statue—personifies Penitent Magdalene just as he personified Terpsichore. Rather than “installing” or “displaying” the sculpture, he has provided accommodation for the saint, another telling invocation of the Pygmalion myth that drives home the idea that the statue is a living being. In addition, and perhaps more importantly, Sommariva is not merely her owner, but rather her host. Sommariva’s townhouse in Paris became a central attraction for a wide variety of European and American visitors, almost all of whom agreed that Canova’s sculptures were the highlight of the collection. The sanctuary that Sommariva created, described by Baron de Freilly as “partly a chapel, partly a boudoir” greatly impressed numerous visitors and created a radically different encounter with the object than the 1808 Salon.67 Throughout the eighteenth century, the townhouse interior had gradually been modified and theorized as a space which could engender emotional responses from both owners and visitors.68 New rooms and new spaces were 65 Cited in Mazzocca, “G. B. Sommariva o il borghese mecenate,” 240. 66 Cited in ibid., 241. 67 Frénilly, Recollections of Baron de Frénilly, 199–200. 68 Charles Rice, The Emergence of the Interior: Architecture, Modernity, Domesticity (London: Routledge, 2007). Meredith Martin has discussed the way space,

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created, including the highly feminized space of the “boudoir,” discussed in chapter three.69 Jill Casid has recently explored the way this space, so closely aligned with erotic femininity and private life, was used to contrast with, and so by virtue establish, the Salon as a more masculine, “public” space.70 In addition, the space in which the Magdalene was exhibited also functioned synonymously as a domestic chapel, a private corner set aside for prayer. Although chapels were not necessarily feminine spaces per se, they often held devotional objects and representations, among which votives devoted to female saints, particularly the Magdalene, were among the most important in France.71 Both boudoir and chapel were intimate spaces for individual contemplation and retreat. The interior of the townhouse—of the home—aligned Sommariva’s private collection and his identity as an individual.72 At the same time, it also encouraged personal reflection by not only heightening but creating awareness of individual subjectivity.73

identity, and emotion were linked in eighteenth-century French architectural theories. See Meredith Martin, “The Ascendancy of the Interior in Eighteenth-Century French Architectural Theory,” in Architectural Space in Eighteenth-Century Europe: Constructing Identities and Interiors, ed. Denise Amy Baxter and Meredith Martin (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010), 15–34. 69 Annik Pardailhé-Galabrun, The Birth of Intimacy: Privacy and Domestic Life in Early Modern Paris, trans. Jocelyn Phelps (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991), 63–64. 70 Jill H. Casid, “Commerce in the ‘Boudoir’,” in Women, Art and the Politics of Identity in Eighteenth-Century Europe, ed. Melissa Hyde and Jennifer Milam (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), 91–114. 71 Pardailhé-Galabrun, The Birth of Intimacy, 199. 72 See Anne Higonnet, A Museum of One’s Own: Private Collecting, Public Gift (Pittsburgh, PA: Periscope Publishing, 2009), esp. chapter 3, “Homes for History,” 81–121. 73 Susan Sidlauskas, Body, Place, and Self in NineteenthCentury Painting (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 19–20.

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The particularities of the display Sommariva selected for Magdalene further reinforced these ideas. Lady Morgan, for instance, wrote of the “small apartment, hung with dark silk, [that] enshrines this marble wonder.”74 Thomas Dibdin was so moved by his encounter with the sculpture that he wrote about it at length: We approach the far-famed MAGDALEN. Immediately opposite the boudoir, were the last mentioned treasures are deposited, you observe a door, or aperture, half covered with silken drapery of a greyish brown tint. There was something mysterious in the appearance, and equally so in the approach. I had no intimation of what it led to; for, as I told you, not a creature besides myself was in the rooms. With a gently raised hand I drew the drapery aside, entered … and looked before me. There stood the MAGDALEN. […] For the f irst f ive minutes I was lost in surprise and admiration. The windows are hid by white curtains; and the interior is hung all over with the same grey silk drapery, before noticed. A glass, placed behind the f igure, affords you a view of the back while you are contemplating the front. This is very ingenious; but it is probably too artificial. The effect of the room, however—from the silken drapery with which it is entirely covered—is, although studied, upon the whole excellent. Of course the minutes flew away quickly in such a place, and before such an object; and I think I viewed the figure, in every possible direction, for full three quarters of an hour.75 74 Lady [Sydney] Morgan, France, 3rd American ed. (Philadelphia: M. Thomas, 1817), 230. 75 Thomas Frognall Dibdin, A Bibliographical Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, 2nd ed., 3 vols. (London: Robert Jennings and John Major, 1829), vol. 2, 312–314.

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For Dibdin, a large part of Magdalene’s allure lay in his solitary interaction with the sculpture, and his enigmatic approach to the sanctuary. His description merges the solemnity of religious awe with the eroticism of a sexual encounter. The shadows of the room, the dimmed lighting, and the hushed setting create the sense of a death vigil, waiting for the penitent to pass. The cool grey silk and shadows would undoubtedly have muted the saint’s flesh, giving her a grayish pallor that would have enhanced the sensation that the viewer was admiring Magdalene mere moments before her death. Likewise, the alabaster lamp would have cast Magdalene’s face and the curves of her body in shadow, emphasizing the contrast between the voluptuousness of the body and the remorseful expression on her face. At the same time, however, by using a mirror to display the rear of the sculpture, Magdalene’s presence as a physical body and as a woman was placed fully on display for viewers, transforming her into a sensual object. Yet, the mirror held the potential to reflect the visitor as well, and in so doing, to create a moment of self-regard and self-reflection. In the shadows of the room, the beholder could find the liberty of privacy, in which he could both examine his own conscience and take pleasure in the Magdalene. The tension between religious austerity and sensuality led to a variety of responses on the part of viewers. Many comments were fueled by aesthetic concerns, as were those of the critics of the 1808 Salon. Dibdin, for instance, felt there was too pronounced a disjunction between the beautiful fullness of the Magdalene’s body and her emaciated face.76 Dibdin also noted that the whole atmosphere in which the Penitent Magdalene was exhibited seemed too “studied” and likewise critiqued what he felt was the inappropriate inclusion of the bronze cross.77 76 Ibid., vol. 2, 315. 77 Ibid., vol. 2, 313–314.

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Medium specificity remained very much an issue, and the pseudo-sacred setting heightened the disjunction between the Magdalene’s spartan existence, the beggarliness of her posture, and the luxuriousness of the bronze. The attention to medium specificity elicited by Sommariva’s display tactics likewise reinforced the earlier interest in the sculpture’s expression. At stake, once again, was the question of whether sculpture was even capable of capturing expression. Thomas Moore thought this was the case and wrote that the Magdalene “excell[ed] in what is generally out of the sphere of sculpture,—expression.”78 He compared Canova’s sculpture to Correggio’s painting of the saint and was inspired to write a poem in which he marveled at the way the Magdalene’s “true expression’s breathing light” was captured by Canova’s chisel. Canova’s imaginative prowess made her “feel, and live and die” as no other artist had.79 Expression manifested itself in every aspect of the figure, and one might argue that it was precisely the work’s sculptural status that allowed Magdalene’s expression to be best fulf illed. That is, unlike a two-dimensional painted surface, Canova’s Magdalene revealed her penitence in three dimensions—in the contours of the marble, in the features of her body, and in every view of her profile. Every aspect of the sculpture revealed Magdalene’s grief, in a way that simply could not have been accomplished by a painting. One reviewer, for instance, noted that, “[s]ettled grief dwells in every line of the countenance, and diffuses 78 See the diary entry for April 7, 1820, in Thomas Moore, Memoirs, Journal and Correspondence of Thomas Moore, ed. John Russell, 8 vols. (London: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, 1853), vol. 3, 110. 79 Thomas Moore, The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore, Including Melodies, Ballads, Etc. Completed in One Volume (Paris: A. and W. Galignani, 1829), 177.

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Fig. 5.18: Antonio Canova, The Penitent Magdalene (detail), version from 1808/1809. Marble, 95 × 70 × 77 cm. The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. Photograph © The State Hermitage Museum / photo by Alexander Lavrentyev

itself over every part of the figure, so that we plainly discover the expression of it even on a side view and when the face is not visible.”80 Another critic expressed the same sentiment, musing that the work invited spectators to spend hours before it, so they could contemplate the way grief suffused not only the saint’s face, but the muscles in her neck, her arms—even her

80 “Art. VIII. The Works of Antonio Canova in Sculpture and Modelling, Engraved in Outline by Henry Moses, with Descriptions from the Italian of the Countess Albrizzi, and a Biographical Memoir by Count Cicognara. 2 Vols. Folio. London. 1824,” North American Review XXIX. New Series. vol. XX. no LXV (Oct. 1829): 455–456.

thumbs.81 Even Lady Morgan meditated on “[t] he rough sole of the small foot” that told the tale of Magdalene’s many “dreary step[s], trod in penitence and hardship”82 (Fig. 5.18). The expression Canova had captured so eloquently in each curve of the saint’s body was activated by the display at Sommariva’s, which enabled every aspect of the sculpture to be viewed. The mirror enabled viewers to take in the saint’s “rough soles” and her desolate countenance in one glance, while the flickering light from the alabaster lamp would have cast her downcast eyes even further into shadow. 81 H., “A Walk Round Paris,” The Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany XIII (Nov. 1823): 526. 82 Morgan, France, 230.

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This chapel-like alcove reinforced the sense of the saint’s grief and the viewer’s empathy for her. The setting redirected viewers’ attention away from their aesthetic considerations towards their emotional reaction to the work of art. That is, visitors’ admiration did not end with their appreciation of Canova’s prowess as a sculptor. Rather, they then were led to consider the way Canova’s work, in the context of Sommariva’s display, elicited their own intense emotions. The Magdalene’s suffering was empathetically drawn out in the viewers themselves. Lady Morgan, for instance, reflected on the penitent and reversed the Pygmalion myth, noting that only a viewer made of marble would not feel emotion in her midst.83 Dibdin agreed, for there was no escaping the fact that “you could not look at her without feeling pity and compassion,” while de Kératry felt a “frisson in the face of such agony.”84 Alexandre Lenoir even used the Penitent Magdalene as the example for “la tristesse et la pleurer,” in his treatise on emotional states, for the Magdalene’s expression “placed the soul of the spectator between admiration and sadness.” 85 The Magdalene inspired emotional responses in viewers which were enhanced by the combination of the setting and the expression she herself revealed. Despite the potential eroticism of the partly nude sculpture, the combination of her expression, Sommariva’s evocative setting, and the 83 Ibid. 84 Dibdin, A Bibliographical Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour, vol. 2, 313, and Auguste Hilarion de Kératry, Du beau dans les arts d’imitation avec un examen raisonné des productions des diverses écoles de peinture et de sculpture, et en particulier de celle de France, 2 vols. (Paris: Audot, 1822), vol. 2, 154, respectively. 85 Alexandre Lenoir, Observations scientifique et critiques sur le génie et les principales productions des peintre et autres artistes le plus célèbre de l’antiquité, du moyen age, et des temps modernes (Paris: B. Mondor, 1821), 129.

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empathy felt by the viewer transformed the sculpture into a solemn message. One reviewer noted that although “[a]t the view of so many beauties, voluptuous emotions begin to steal upon the mind,” Magdalene’s penitence, the cord, the cross, the “drooping head, [and] the dishevelled hair”—the very attributes seen to such dramatic effect in Sommariva’s chapel— “chasten every idle thought, and inspire, even without the aid of the countenance, the deepest sentiments of melancholy and pity.”86 One British correspondent, David Carey, argued that the work became a dramatic “moral lesson” in which “the eye is made the medium of instruction to the understanding.”87 So profound was the work’s unusual combination of beauty and pain that it could move a viewer to tears.88 Discussion of Penitent Magdalene’s expression thus elicited intense responses from viewers who became increasingly attuned to their own expression of emotion as they beheld the work. With the Magdalene, Canova had created a work that expressed pain, regret, and sadness so powerfully that it, in turn, elicited those same sentiments from the beholders themselves. The combination of Sommariva’s display and Canova’s attention to the Magdalene’s expression roused visitors to concerns that were not simply aesthetic in scope. Absorbed as they were by the Magdalene’s desperation, visitors were more forgiving of what they had originally perceived of as the sculpture’s flaws. Wooed by the atmosphere Sommariva created they were then further moved by the sculpture’s sentiment. 86 “Art. VIII. The Works of Antonio Canova,” 456. 87 David Carey, “For the Monthly Magazine. On the Actual State of the Fine Arts, Painting, Sculpture and Statuary, in France; Written in Paris, by David Carey Esq.,” The Monthly Magazine; or, British Register L. Part II (Nov. 1, 1820): 322. 88 Medwin, “Canova. Leaves from the Autobiography of an Amateur,” 372.

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Even if their reactions were not strictly religious in scope, their senses were nonetheless transported. In a world where connoisseurship was an increasingly professionalized skill, the reaction to Penitent Magdalene in Sommariva’s home reveals a parallel approach to art, one which appealed to viewers’ emotional sensibilities and in which expertise in aesthetics took second place. Magdalene’s strength lay in the work’s supposedly “universal” appeal, and it was precisely this appeal which was celebrated by writers. No accompanying didactic texts were required to instruct visitors how to assess the work’s strengths, as had been the case with Perseus, Venus and Adonis, and Polinnia. Viewers could simply look, feel, and be moved. Sommariva’s display further reinforced the democratic appeal of the Magdalene. One did not need to be a connoisseur to appreciate her, a point that had been made repeatedly—if, at times, to their annoyance—by critics at the 1808 Salon and repeated in the 1820s and 1830s. According to Henry David Inglis, the Scottish writer and journalist writing under the pseudonym Derwent Conway, “It is not to the connoisseur in statuary, alone, that this work is interesting; […] [for] he who possesses a deep sensibility may be ignorant of all the mysteries of sculpture, and yet gaze with rapture upon the Magdalene.”89 One did not need an education in the arts to admire Canova’s Magdalene; as long as the beholder had a profound sense of sentiment and a soul that could be moved, he, too, could share in the Magdalene’s pain. Expression could transcend connoisseurial concerns by inspiring pity, melancholy, sensitivity, and empathy in viewers. Sommariva’s display increased the collective fascination with the sculpture 89 Derwent Conway [Henry David Inglis], “The Misfortune of Alice, a Domestic Tale, or Another Judgment of the World [with a] Note upon the Magdalene of Canova,” Tales of Ardennes (London: G. B. Whittaker, 1825), 190–191.

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by bringing out the emotional depths which were already intrinsic to the subject matter and which had already been emphasized by Canova’s workmanship. The ideal work of art became one that could draw in a universal audience because of its emotional resonances. In fact, by 1822 an obituary of Canova argued that a work without natural expression and grace would never capture the public’s “vote.”90 This appeal to a broad audience was one critical factor in the understanding of Canova’s Magdalene as his most profoundly “modern” work of art.

Sculpture as a Modern Art Even though visitors to Sommariva’s collection had relatively consistent reactions to the Penitent Magdalene, admiring Canova’s skill in carving, her expression, and their own emotional reaction to the work of art, the sculpture remained an active subject for debate in France in the 1820s, 1830s, and 1840s. Critics continued to use the work as a focal point for discussions regarding medium specificity and the role of expression in sculpture. Due to its lengthy stay in Paris and continued public display, Penitent Magdalene became the centerpiece for discussion not only about the nature of modern art, but also of French cultural patrimony. Although discussions about the Magdalene in the 1820s and 1830s lacked the rigor of seventeenth-century arguments which pitted the “ancients” against the “moderns” in the Académie Française, traces of that argument were revived in discussions of the sculpture, as they had been in the 1808 Salon. One school of thought, led by Victor Cousin, was rooted firmly in the belief that sculpture remained a singularly “ancient” art. Above all else, it had been meant 90 D., “Beaux-Arts. Antoine Canova,” Journal de débats politiques et littéraires (Nov. 25, 1822): 4.

Defining Modern Sculpture

to reveal the beauty of pagan forms. Painting, on the other hand, was rooted in expression, and therefore was a fundamentally Christian—and thus a modern—art form. Cousin’s critique about the nature of artistic media, however, developed out of his analysis of the decline of the fine arts in the eighteenth century, in which he argued that each media had gradually lost the qualities that most clearly defined one from the other. With the arrival of the nineteenth century, even Canova and David, the most “skilled” artists of the period, were successful at creating moving works of art, “but in a century where there could be neither painting, nor sculpture.”91 For Cousin, each art had lost track of its most central character, and sculpture could not exist as a truly modern art form. Although some writers, such as Gustave Planche, agreed with Cousin, other authors directly refuted Cousin’s view that sculpture had to be relegated to the dustbin of history.92 Amédée Duquesnel, for instance, contrasted ancient Greek sculpture, which was “impassioned for physical beauty” with the Christian “spiritualization of beauty.” “All of antiquity,” he continued, “could not have created the Magdalene of Canova.”93 Likewise, in an obituary of the artist from 1822, one writer noted that in the Magdalene Canova had managed to “concentrate in one sole figure all that which paganism uses to seduce, and that which Christianity offers for serious thought.”94 It was, in short, the “statue-dogma of Christianity.”95 91 Victor Cousin, “Cours de l’histoire de la philosophie,” in Œuvres de Victor Cousin. Tome premier (Bruxelles: Société Belge de Libraire, 1840), 119. 92 Gustave Planche, Salon de 1831 (Paris: Pinard, 1831), 142–144. 93 Amédée Duquesnel, Histoire des lettres avant le Christianisme. Cours de littérature, 7 vols. (Paris: Eugène Renduel, 1836), vol. 1, 46–47. 94 D., “Beaux-arts. Antoine Canova,” 4. 95 “Canova (Antoine),” Biographie universelle ancienne et moderne. Supplément. Cam-Ché (Paris: I.-G. Michaud,

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August Wilhelm von Schlegel also railed against Cousin’s “severe” judgment, for sculpture was no longer simply the “representation of the beauty of form […] but also the expression of the sentiments of the soul.”96 Likewise, J. Coindet, in his 1849 Histoire de la peinture en Italie, pointed out that Canova’s Magdalene denied Cousin’s claim that modern sculpture could not exist. Since the Magdalene was based on faith and repentance, outside the traditional bounds of antiquity, it merged the beauty of ancient forms “without losing any of the expression which compose the beautiful productions of both ancient and modern sculpture.” Penitent Magdalene was a “victorious refutation” of Cousin’s claims.97 Perhaps Stendhal was the most vociferous petitioner for Magdalene’s modernity for he not only claimed that Canova captured expression in modern sculpture, but that Canova had “invented” a new type of ideal beauty closer to modern tastes than that of the Greeks; Canova had understood how the moderns “esteem spirit and feeling” more than physical brawn.98 Arguments that lay under the surface in 1808, wherein Magdalene ref lected a new proto-Romantic interpretation of sculpture, were, by the 1820s and 1830s, made explicit. The work’s modernity lay not only in its originality, which had been celebrated in 1808, but also in its expressivity. The sculpture was physical proof that expression and Christian sentiment were not simply the province of painting, for in the Penitent Magdalene, Canova had used his 1836), vol. 60. Supplément, 104. 96 August Wilhelm von Schlegel, Leçons sur l’histoire et la théorie des beaux arts, par A. G. Schlegel, trans. A. F. Couturier (Paris: Pichon et Didier, Libraires, 1830), 386–387. 97 J. Coindet, Histoire de la peinture en Italie (Geneva: Joël Cherbuliez, 1849), vol. 1, 185. 98 Stendhal, “Salon de 1824,” Mélanges d’art et de littérature (Paris: Michel Lévy Frères, 1867), 232.

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“magical touch” to create “the ineffable expression of religious pain.”99 Likewise, the freedom of Canova’s touch—its freedom from Academic proscription and antique models—and his ability to capture expression and sentiment established the very type of artistic production that was celebrated most by the Romantics. For some contemporary writers, Magdalene was not simply co-opted by the Romantic school as an example of modern art, but also became one of the sculptures that best described the school’s tenets. One of most vocal proponents of Romantic literature, for instance, Henri de Latouche, celebrated the Penitent Magdalene’s liberation from antiquity and the model alike. In comparison with ancient masterpieces, such as Laocoön, who merely reflected physical pain, and Niobe, who railed against the gods, Penitent Magdalene’s despair, melancholy, and accep­ tance of her fate “could be called Romantic—and that, perhaps, is the secret to her success.”100 Schlegel summarized the ethos of the era best. “The poetry of the ancients,” he wrote, “was that of possessing. Ours is that of longing.”101 Well into the nineteenth century, sentiment and expression—the “exultation of suffering” so admired by the Romantics—remained the key to truly modern sculpture.102 The trick, however, was not only that the artist had to capture these emotions in the work of art, but rather that he also had to elicit them from the spectator himself. Madame de Stäel, for 99 Quatremère de Quincy, Canova et ses ouvrages, 67–69. 100 De Latouche and Réveil, Œuvre de Canova, n.p. 101 August Wilhelm von Schlegel, as cited in Wendy S. Mercer, “German Romanticism and French Aesthetic Theory,” in A Companion to Art Theory, ed. Paul Smith and Carolyn Wilde (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002), 150. 102 Philippe Ariès, Georges Duby, and Michelle Perrot, eds., A History of Private Life: From the Fires of Revolution to the Great War (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1990), vol. 4, 520.

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instance, argued that the aim of the artist was to “liberate the sentiment imprisoned in the depths of the soul.”103 Baudelaire, although not a fan of either Canova or of sculpture, the latter of which he famously deemed “tiresome,” nonetheless defined Romanticism in terms that recall Canova’s Magdalene. Romanticism was “modern art: that is to say, intimacy, spirituality, colour, aspiration to the inf inite, expressed by every means available to the arts.”104 More importantly, this “mode of feeling” was not something to be found in the outside world, but was only to be found within oneself.105 In fact, Baudelaire’s description of Romanticism nearly replicates the reaction the public had to Penitent Magdalene. Canova, after all, had not only captured this “mode of feeling” in the representation of Magdalene through his skill in carving, but he also had succeeded in eliciting deep sensations from beholders. For all their differences, at least in this instance, Canova and Baudelaire had similar aims. And few sculptors succeeded as well as Canova had in capturing the essence of Romanticism and modernity, for even as late as 1878, Eugène Véron complained that “if we wish sculpture to become a truly modern and independent art, we must apply ourselves above all to developing it in the direction of the modern spirit, which is to say in that of expression and movement.”106 By the 1820s and 1830s, the Penitent Magdalene had been fully co-opted by French artists, critics, and the public alike. Long gone were objections to the work’s display in France that 103 Madame de Staël, as cited in Mercer, “German Romanticism,” 155. 104 Charles Baudelaire, “The Salon of 1846,” Art in Paris, 1845–1862: Salons and Other Exhibitions, ed. Jonathan Mayne (London: Phaidon, 1970), 111 and 47, respectively. 105 Ibid., 46. 106 Eugène Véron, L’esthétique (Paris: C. Reinwald, 1878), 237.

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had hounded Canova in 1808. Magdalene’s popularity among the Romantics gave the work new resonance in France. She was celebrated both for her expression and her embodiment of individual subjectivity, which were understood as particularly modern and French concerns. Canova’s work was elevated to the status of a French national treasure. Even Sommariva himself undoubtedly flourished from his position as the work’s patron. Critics praised him as a “naturalized Frenchman,” “who belonged to France for his taste, as for his affections.”107 They likewise congratulated themselves for appreciating Sommariva’s “noble generosity” and the excellence of his collection.108 Sommariva’s liberal patronage became a conduit by which the French ensured their cultural superiority. His patronage enabled the work of (adopted) “French” masters to remain on “paternal” soil, at a time when so many other works of art were “threatened with exile.”109 Not only was Sommariva celebrated as a patron of the arts, who “chose” France over his own nation, but the nationalist urge to protect cultural patrimony that emerged in the 1820s, 1830s, and 1840s can be read as a macrocosmic representation of the impulse Sommariva himself expressed towards his collection.110 To put it another way, let us consider Susan Stewart’s argument that one of the most modern ways of articulating the self was through the act of collecting. In her words, “the ultimate term in the series that marks the collection is the ‘self’, the articulation of the collector’s own ‘identity’.”111 Therefore, the distinction Schlegel 107 Lettres à David, 163, and De Kératry, Annuaire de l’école française, xiv, respectively. 108 Lettres à David, 140. 109 De Kératry, Annuaire de l’école française, xiv 110 De Latouche and Réveil, Œuvre de Canova, n.p. 111 Susan Stewart, On Longing: Narratives of the Miniature, the Gigantic, the Souvenir, the Collection (Durham,

drew between “longing” and “possession” collapses if we think of the way that “longing”—the desire for self-actualization—is often realized through the act of possession. One of the most modern ways of articulating the self was through the act of collecting. Collecting is a form of selfactualization. It is understandable, then, why Magdalene, of all works, was so easily co-opted by nationalist sentiment. The intense sentiment and longing for completeness captured by Magdalene’s expression and which was echoed in beholders’ responses could perhaps be assuaged if only they could possess her. The self-realization achieved through the act of collecting was not, however, limited to acts of possession by individuals alone. In this moment in early-nineteenth-century France, when the nation-state was so new, the urge to protect cultural patrimony can be read as a way in which the state itself attempted to fulfill, complete, and actualize its own identity. The desire for possession could be, and was, felt on a national level. The Romantic tension between the uniqueness of the individual and that individual’s desire to achieve unity with nature and his fellow man could be resolved through a communal act of ownership. Works owned by the nation belonged to the collective, and in so doing also symbolically belonged to each and every individual who made up that collective. Just as Sommariva himself strove to fulfill a psychological desire for completeness through his relentless act of collecting, so too did the new nation-state of France strive to actualize itself through its cultural patrimony and the creation of repositories for that patrimony, namely public museums. Yet it is also important to recognize the public museum contributed to and shaped the identity of the nation even as it was shaped by the nation. Just as a collector is shaped by his own collection, so too were the NC: Duke University Press, 1993), 162.

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French nation and its citizens shaped by their national museums, particularly the Louvre. Carol Duncan, for instance, has pointed out that the civic rituals enacted by attending the Louvre allowed individuals to understand their identity in nationalist terms and assert their role as French citizens.112 National longing found its ultimate fulfillment in the space of the museum. As in Girodet’s Pygmalion and Galatea, the relationships between museum and nation, museum and citizen, and nation and citizen are characterized by a field of continuous emanations, transformations, desires, and striving—all of which had art at its core. With Penitent Magdalene adopted as one of the “riches of France,” it was understood that it was the right and duty of French citizens to safeguard the work.113 With the death of Sommariva in 1826, nothing changed in the status or exhibition conditions of the Magdalene, for the collection passed directly to his son, Luigi Sommariva, who maintained his father’s townhouse in Paris. The sculpture, it seemed, had become a permanent part of Parisian cultural heritage. With the death of Luigi in 1839, however, and the subsequent sale of the collection, the situation changed drastically.114 112 See Carol Duncan, “From the Princely Gallery to the Public Art Museum: The Louvre Museum and the National Gallery, London,” in Representing the Nation: A Reader: History, Heritage and Museums, ed. David Boswell and Jessica Evans (London: Routledge, 1999), 308–311. 113 De Latouche and Réveil, Œuvre de Canova, n.p. 114 For the sale catalogue, see Giovanni Battista di Count Sommariva and Charles Paillet, Catalogue de la galerie du Comte de Sommariva, comprenant la collection de tableaux de l’école d’Italie, celle des peintres de l’école française, quelques tableaux d’après les plus grands maîtres … groupes et figures en marbre … dont la Madeleine, un des chefs-d’œuvre de Canova … par Charles Paillet,… la vente … aura lieu les 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 Et 23 Février (Paris: E.-B. Delanchy, 1839), 66.

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Despite criticisms of the quality of Sommariva’s collection as a whole, “which reeked of empire,” visitors flooded the townhouse, “to which they knew the way as well as they did the way to the Louvre.”115 Although the collection had functioned and was appreciated by the public in a dual manner, as both private collection and public museum, the realization that it was not a public museum dawned suddenly with the death of Sommariva’s son and the threat of the collection’s loss. Shaken out of any complacency towards Canova’s Magdalene because of the sudden fear that it might leave Paris, the public began speculating immediately as to who might buy the work. Fear of its departure was fueled by the inevitable association between Canova and the last great exodus of cultural capital from Paris, in which he played a critical role, namely, the emptying of the Louvre after the fall of Napoleon.116 Theories poured forth in the contemporary journals. Would Magdalene remain in France? Some writers hypothesized that King Louis-Philippe would purchase the work for the recently constructed Church of the Madeleine.117 Others hoped it would take its rightful spot in the Louvre, adding yet another work to the long list of objects which owed their place in the museum to the King’s generosity. Of course, the work’s “touching and natural expression” was cited as one of the reasons the piece “must absolutely” remain in France.118 The moment passed, however, and the King did not purchase the work for the Louvre. Nonetheless, the French were spared the loss of the sculpture, for it was bought by the private 115 “De la Galerie de M. de Sommariva,” L’Artiste 2 serie, tome II, 11 Livraison (1839): 185. 116 “Nouvelles et faits divers,” La Presse 2 année (Feb. 21, 1839): [3]. 117 Charles Malo, “Ephémérides,” La France littéraire XXXIV (1839): 287. 118 “De la Galerie de M. de Sommariva,” 186.

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collector Alexandre-Marie Aguado, the Marquis de Las Marismas.119 Aguado did not have Sommariva’s flare for exhibition techniques, but despite the fact that the sculpture “sadly, was placed in a somber room,” the Penitent Magdalene remained on display in Paris where it continued to garner praise, for “no statue [had] been produced since antiquity that [could] compare” with it.120 The death of Aguado in 1842, however, a mere three years after he had bought the sculpture, once again rendered the statue’s status precarious. With astonishing rapidity, rumors swirled about its future fate when it was announced the Aguado collection would go on sale in Paris in March 1843. The Russian Emperor allegedly expressed interest in the collection, a rumor that was quickly squelched in the papers.121 Some writers declared with certainty that Aguado had donated the statue to his parish church, Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.122 Others had lingering hopes that it would be purchased for the Louvre. But with the collection on view before the sale, these aspirations were shattered, for no museum official stepped forward to purchase the work.123 119 “Nouvelles des arts. Vente de la galerie de Sommariva,” Journal des artistes XIII Année, 1er volume, 8 (24 Feb. 1839): 125. 120 A. R., “Galerie Aguado,” Le Ménestrel. Journal de musique et de litterature Septième année, n. 22.333 (26 Avril 1840): n.p. [2], and X. X., “Une visite à la galerie de M. Aguado (2e Article),” Journal des beaux-arts et de la littérature 23 (30 June 1839): 362, respectively. 121 Henri Trianon, “Bulletin des beaux-arts,” La France littéraire. Revue. Politique. Sciences. Beaux-arts X, end série (1842): 178. 122 This rumor was repeated in numerous journals. “Beaux-arts. Travaux publics,” La vérité. Journal général du commerce et de l’industrie (7 Mai 1842): n.p. [3], and “Faits et nouvelles,” Bulletin des beaux-arts (5 Mai 1842): n.p. [4]. 123 “Nouvelles,” Journal des beaux-arts et de la littérature X année, 1er volume, 2 (15 Jan. 1843): 31.

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The sale went on as planned, and from March 20–28, 1843, Aguado’s collection was sold off, piece by piece.124 An Italian collector, the Duke of Galliera, purchased Penitent Magdalene for 59,500 francs (approximately US$300,000 today).125 He quickly exported the piece to Genova, where it remains today.126 With the loss of the sculpture, journalists lambasted their countrymen for not acting quickly enough to save the work. Léon Gozlan, the French novelist and playwright, was by far the most vocal critic, and in an article entitled, “Un crime de plus,” he bemoaned the death of Aguado. If he still lived, Gozlan wailed, “[h]is Magdalene would not be placed now in a wooden box, on a bed of straw, and wrapped in a canvas like a corpse.”127 That the sale of this work should occur in Paris was a national tragedy; had such an act occurred in any other country the Parisian press would have condemned them for losing a cultural treasure.128 But, Gozlan concluded with a final blow: If there is a humiliating, shameful, thing for a nation, it is not that it does not produce great things; nations have centuries of despondency, 124 See Dubois, G. Benou, Alexis Wery, and Bonnefons de Lavialle (Firm), Catalogue de tableaux anciens des écoles espagnole, italienne, flamande, hollandaise et allemande, statues anciennes et modernes, marbres, etc.: composant la galerie de M. Aguado Marquis de Las Marismas: dont la vente aux enchères publiques, aura lieu par suite de son décès en son hôtel … à Paris (Paris: Maulde et Renot, 1843). 125 I am grateful to Matthew Boylan, senior reference librarian at the New York Public Library, for providing me with this estimate. 126 “Nouvelles,” Journal des beaux-arts et de la littérature X année, 1er volume, 13 (2 Avril 1843): 208. 127 Léon Gozlan, “Un crime de plus,” Les beaux-arts. Illustration des arts et de la littérature, ed. L. Curmer (Paris: Schneider et Langrand, 1843), vol. 1, 70. 128 Ibid.

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as men have years of suffering. Moreover, a government is not responsible for the sterility of an epoch. But that which demeans, blots and discounts it, is to allow to be taken from its subjects the grandeur that the state alone should have and maintain. […] Be that as it may, Canova’s statue is already packed: she surrenders herself to Genova, where she will never leave, because the Lazzaroni of that country would rather shed their blood than to let her leave once they have her. In that great nation, art has seeped into religion and religion into the blood. They are always pagans, thank God! on that note. But you, you were under the Republic. You were under the Sphinx of the Egyptian campaign, under the lions of the Directory—the Republic, the Directory, the empire did not know how to write, but they knew how to conquer (not to mince words, they knew how to steal). You do not even know how to steal. They had taken, stolen, the Transfiguration, the Apollo, the Venus and a hundred other masterpieces. You, who did not even know how to keep them, who did not even have the lesser audacity to receive stolen goods, you have allowed the Magdalene of Canova to leave. You are despicable! But what should you have done? Smash it. They would have reproached you less!129

For Gozlan, there could be no more shameful thing for the French than the fact that they allowed the Magdalene to be taken from them. The great governments of France had amassed a wealth of artistic treasures, yet the government of Louis-Philippe could not even retain the treasures it had, much less create, or even obtain, new ones. The French’s self-identification as “men of letters” did not translate into richer

129 Ibid.

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cultural patrimony for the nation. For Gozlan, it merely signaled inactivity, ineptness, and lack of rigor in moments when true grit was required. In contrast, the Italians not only appreciated great works of art, but they were also willing to die for them. They had absorbed the f ine arts completely into their blood, into their very cultural identity. The contrast between the two nations was so striking that Gozlan even felt that if the French had not been able to keep the Magdalene for themselves, it would have been better to destroy the statue entirely than to allow her to fall into another country’s hands. Gozlan’s strident berating of the public, French artists, and the French state for allowing the Magdalene’s export brought the status of the sculpture in France full circle. With the loss of the work came a painful reminder of the masterpieces that had slipped through French fingers in 1815. The nation and its citizens, collective and individuals alike, had abdicated their proper responsibility to France’s cultural heritage. They were all implicated in the loss of a work whose expression had rendered it central not only to Romantic identity, but to French identity as well. Throughout the century, the question of who was responsible for protecting the nation’s cultural heritage would return again and again whenever Canova or the Magdalene were mentioned. Yet, despite the loss of the sculpture, the expressivity of the Magdalene would have long-standing effects on the production and reception of modern art. Expression would remain a key factor in French artistic theories well into the twentieth century. The sculpture, previously maligned for its foreignness, had become woven into the fabric of French cultural identity.



Conclusion: Aftereffects Abstract: The conclusion, “Aftereffects,” traces the legacy of the responses to Canova’s work into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The discourse generated by exhibitions of his sculptures transformed sculptural theory and reveals the power of public dialogue and criticism to assert change. At the same time, Canova’s exhibitions prefigured the embodied and immersive experience that is now the province of “installation art.” They inspired viewers to reflect on their experience, share their ideas, and converse and debate with one another, celebrating a communal act of engagement with works of art. Keywords: art criticism, installation art, twentieth-century sculpture

The central position Canova held in the art world in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries resonates in multiple ways in our experience of art today. Canova and his patrons’ attentiveness to display foreshadows our appreciation and experience of sculpture in broad, often immersive environments. His devotion to the viewer’s engagement with his work and deep-rooted commitment to the art of looking energized his audience and inspired vociferous conversations. Viewers debated the nature of artistic production, the writing of art history, the context and significance of exhibitions, and personal emotional reactions to works of art. They presaged the kinds of conversations held by audiences and critics today. The discourse about Canova’s work—the range of writers, the variety of publications, and the breadth of their distribution—read as the analog precursor to the impact of criticism and the written word in the era of social media. More importantly they reveal the power of public dialogue and criticism to assert change, for beholders’ discussions

and debates about Canova’s works profoundly transformed sculptural theory and shaped our modern ideas about the medium. If we consider the legacy of sculptural theory, we can trace each of the responses to Canova’s work well into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The long-standing problem of treating key aspects of sculptural production as separate continues, thus the debate in Naples between Marchesini, Rezzonico, and Gargallo about invention, execution, and the writing of art applies to broader discussions about art criticism today. Rezzonico’s attention to technique, which was so unusual and so grating to Gargallo, may well be one of the first modern articulations of sculptural practice in criticism. Canova’s mastery as a carver enabled Rezzonico to privilege the physical making of the work and thus to invert the usual hierarchy of invention over execution. Rezzonico’s criticism thus foreshadowed both the recent resurgence of interest in Canova’s sculpting techniques as well as the early-twentieth-century interest in direct

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carving by practitioners such as Constantin Brancusi and Henry Moore. The Neapolitan debate was only the beginning of an outpouring of criticism about Canova’s work that lasted until well after his death in 1822, and subsequent writing on Canova continued to divide his artistic practice into two poles. In these texts, Canova’s work was regularly judged by its strengths and weaknesses in invention and execution. Despite the praise Canova received for his sculptural technique, very rarely did that criticism exhibit the kind of technical understanding showed by Rezzonico—however marginal it may truly have been. Instead, critics fell back on generic praise for Canova’s ability to create the illusion of flesh. The omission of technical language indicates the fundamental challenge of writing about sculpture. Namely, it is nearly impossible to speak with specificity about technique when it is dependent on a complex artisanal system and craft that few understand, much less have attempted. Yet writers did not hold back in their detailed and vociferous criticism of Canova’s invention. As the exemplar of the neoclassical ideal, Canova regularly modeled works on ancient sources, a practice which opened him up to criticism about the originality of his work. Criticism about idea and form requires much less particularized knowledge than criticism about sculptural technique. In the period around 1800, in fact, the dependence on classical art made this kind of criticism even easier, for one need not be a connoisseur to recognize the most famous antique models and see the dependency of modern works upon them. Unfortunately for Canova, he was regularly seen as lacking in creativity and invention. This reached its height in the criticism of Triumphant Perseus, which was a turning point in attitudes towards Canova’s work. More importantly, however, criticism of Perseus helped usher in new definitions of imitation, copy, and original.

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With a powerful collision of concerns—of authorship on the one hand, and viewership on the other—the nature of imitation was radically transformed at the beginning of the nineteenth century. It was no longer understood as emulation, nor was it seen as a critical part of the creative process. As a strategy upon which the artist could rely for training and education, imitation became suspect. It was transformed instead into a term considered primarily from the point of view of the beholder. In so doing, “imitation” lost its generative potential and was reflective, instead, of “the anxiety of influence.”1 Imitation’s dual-sided nature—the confluence of inspiration and influence—led to a search for sources on the part of viewers, who wanted to be reassured that they were looking at something “new.” It was not, however, only “imitation” that was affected. As “imitation” gradually took on the meaning of “copy,” “copy,” in turn, needed a foil. The “original” took on even greater significance. The avant-garde concept of the original was born in this moment. “Original” works had to be conceptually novel and physically authentic—which is to say, made by the artist himself. A premium was placed on innovation, creativity, and uniqueness. The ramifications were significant. Although twentieth-century artistic practices helped splinter the avant-garde “myth” of originality, debates about what constitutes an “original” work of art continue to have significant aesthetic, philosophical, legal, and monetary implications.2 1 Harold Bloom, The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973). 2 See Rosalind Krauss’ seminal article, Rosalind E. Krauss, “The Originality of the Avant-Garde: A Postmodernist Repetition,” October (Autumn 1981): 47–66. For a brief, but excellent, survey on the way the search for sources has had a profound impact on the history of intellectual property legislation and contemporary art, see the coda in Elizabeth Cropper, The Domenichino Affair:

Conclusion: Aftereffec ts

For modern artists and museums, the consequences are great. Artists continue to be judged by standards of innovation and uniqueness, and museum collections privilege “original” works of art that are rare and distinctive. Contemporary debates about the nature of works of art, particularly the nature of sculpture, are also seen in the legacies of the conversations around morbidezza, sculpture’s softness, and the paragone, the relationship between painting and sculpture. By the early twentieth century, three trends transformed the understanding of morbidezza. First, abstraction divorced the representation of form from realism, thus breaking the link between the body and the verisimilitude of skin. Second, artists hailed “truth to material” which meant that workmanship which celebrated the material’s intrinsic qualities, rather than seemingly transforming it into something else, was admired.3 Finally, the Surrealists exploited softness in their promotion of “formlessness,” or the informe, rendering it abject—the very opposite of ideal sculpture. 4 Yet despite changing attitudes towards softness, many of the concerns raised by Canova’s Venus Italica remain central to sculptural representations of the human figure. The tension between Novelty, Imitation, and Theft in Seventeenth-Century Rome (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2005), especially 193–207. 3 See, for example, works by Constantin Brancusi and Henry Moore. Judith Zilcer, “The Theory of Direct Carving,” Oxford Art Journal (Nov. 1981): 44–49, and Sarah Victoria Turner, “Henry Moore and Direct Carving: Technique, Concept, Context,” in Henry Moore: Sculptural Process and Public Identity, Tate Research Publication, 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/ henry-moore/sarah-victoria-turner-henry-moore-anddirect-carving-technique-concept-context-r1151303. 4 The concept of the informe was f irst articulated by Georges Bataille in 1929. See Yves-Alain Bois and Rosalind Krauss, Formless: A User’s Guide (New York: Zone Books, 1997), 6.

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flesh and stone, penetrable and impenetrable, representation and reality, science and art, and life and death are still predominant themes in the discourse on sculpture, mimesis, and “the real.” From blockbuster museum shows such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s 2018 “Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body,” to more “scientific” exhibitions such as “Body Worlds” in which the human body is flayed, “plastinated,” and placed on display, contemporary artists and audiences remain obsessed with works of art that approximate living beings and reveal the interior of the human body. The “Pygmalion effect” whereby Canova’s sculptures evoked life has been transformed into these more visceral representations of the body and its interior. The slippage between real and ideal captured in these modern def initions of morbidezza reflect ways Canova’s work also contributed to broader def initions of sculpture and its importance, even if it was detrimental to the medium. For instance, the triumph of sculpture celebrated by Cicognara in 1817—and the concomitant privileging of touch—was brief. Until the mid-nineteenth century, sculpture remained a dominant art in Italy, especially in Rome, where sculptors’ studios attracted tourists and ex-patriots. This did not hold true for the rest of Europe, however. Sculpture continued to be, as it had been, an expensive, difficult, and time-consuming art to produce. Installations in museums that encouraged the exhibition of painting and sculpture together fell out of favor as the century progressed, institutionalizing the division between the two arts.5 Beholders had fewer opportunities to compare the two media. Finally, the continued association of 5 Cecilia Hurley, “La présentation du ‘paragone’ dans les dispositifs muséaux au XIXe siècle,” in Idols and Museum Pieces: The Nature of Sculpture, Its Historiography and Exhibition History, 1640–1880, ed. Caroline van Eck (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017), 195–206.

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sculpture with classical models undermined the notion that sculpture was a modern art. In Paris, which was quickly becoming the center of the modern art world, monumentality and the very permanence of sculpture deemed it “tiresome.”6 Painting, with its ephemerality and immediacy, became the medium of modernity, but even painting’s triumph did not interrupt the quest for what seemed to otherwise be an oxymoron—modern sculpture. Here, too, Canova’s sculptures played a surprising role; the “expression” of Canova’s Penitent Magdalene found its true legacy in the work of Auguste Rodin. Formally, the work of the neoclassical artist and the fin-de-siècle sculptor could not be more different. Canova’s subject matter, unblemished bodies, and smooth surfaces were a far cry from Rodin’s use of unfinished, fragmentary, and combinable figures. Different, too, was their working process. Rodin himself did not carve marble and his engagement with form was largely defined by the additive process of working with clay. What Rodin’s works did have in common with Canova’s Magdalene—and, indeed, where they surpassed Canova’s work—was in the representation of individual emotion and despair. This was the “expression and movement” that Eugène Véron had been seeking in modern sculpture.7 “Expression” was cited repeatedly in criticism of Rodin as one of his strengths, but the formal differences between the artists exacerbated the gulf

between neoclassicism and modern sculpture.8 By the end of the century, Canova was no more than a relic, a harbinger of the past; Rodin was the future. Stendhal, who had once defended Canova’s inventiveness, was invoked by critics who questioned the author’s taste. Stendhal’s admiration for Michelangelo was heralded as prescient anticipation of Rodin, for the Renaissance master’s non-finito clearly provided the formal legacy for the modern artist. But the same critic who praised Stendhal for his foresight could not help but ask, “But would he have liked [Rodin], who loved only Canova!”9 It was inconceivable that a beholder who admired the aesthetics of the neoclassical sculptor could also admire the modern master. The elevation of Michelangelo in Rodin’s hagiography not only reaffirmed the latter’s greatness, but also established a set of formal values that were to be the core of modern sculpture into the twentieth century. The non-finito, or unfinished quality of Michelangelo’s work, emphasized process and celebrated the sculptor’s workmanship. Jagged and deep indentations in the marble—visible tool marks—brought to the fore the laborious process of sculpting that was hidden by Canova’s perfectly smooth surfaces. At the same time, Rodin’s reuse of figures and exploration of size and scale revealed the creative potential of recombination and reproduction. As a result, “modern” sculpture in the twentieth century was defined by a series of terms that would have been incomprehensible to Canova. Sculptors embraced direct carving and “truth to material.” Improvisational sketches

6 Charles Baudelaire, “The Salon of 1846,” Art in Paris, 1845–1862: Salons and Other Exhibitions, ed. Jonathan Mayne (London: Phaidon, 1970), 111. 7 Jacqueline Lichtenstein also points out the difficulty the French had in imagining modern sculpture, which would ultimately lie in expression and movement. Jacqueline Lichtenstein, The Blind Spot: An Essay on the Relations between Painting and Sculpture in the Modern Age (Los Angeles: The Getty Research Institute, 2008), 150 and 155.

8 Rodin himself celebrated sculptural expression. Frederic Lawton cited the sculptor in his biography of the artist. “‘I have come gradually to feel that sculptural expression is the essence of the statuary art—expression through modelling.’” See Frederick Lawton, The Life and Work of Auguste Rodin (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1907), 161. There are many other examples in the early criticism of Rodin which refer to his “expression.” 9 Octave Mirbeau, “Auguste Rodin,” L’art moderne 15.25 (23 June 1895): 198.

Conclusion: Aftereffec ts

were valued more than highly finished forms.10 Figuration was abandoned in favor of abstraction. And “objects” replaced “statues.” The categories of what we define as “sculpture” are now radically different than they were two hundred years ago. So too are the display conditions that activated Canova’s works. In the (often white) museum galleries, surrounded by other sculptures, they are no longer the sole and central focus of attention. For those critics unaware of the controversy his work caused in the nineteenth century, his neoclassical creations may seem insipid. Yet, Canova is always a crowd favorite. Even in the blandest exhibition conditions, material seems transformed, surfaces invite caress, undulating curves and sheer beauty inspire awe. Perhaps the most powerful part of Canova’s legacy, however, is not the material beauty of his sculptures or even the long-lasting impact

10 Valentine de Saint-Point, “La double personnalité de A. Rodin,” La nouvelle revue 43 (Nov.–Dec. 1906): 37.

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on sculptural theory. Instead, we might celebrate his innovative exhibitions, the strategies by which he engaged and energized his audience and activated the broader public imagination. Canova’s displays, with their architectural features, dramatic lighting, and physical engagement with objects prefigured the embodied and immersive experience that is now the province of “installation art.” They inspired viewers to reflect on their experience, share their ideas, converse and debate with one another—in short, to speak their mind about sculpture. Both in the exhibition of his works and in criticism that followed, Canova created opportunities for connection and engagement among beholders. In this sense, his legacy is not just the rarified transformation of sculptural theory, but a communal act of engagement with works of art.

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Index

References to illustrations are in italics Canova’s works are listed alphabetically under: works (Canova) Abate, Felice 54, 56 Accademia dell’Arcadia 62, 69 Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, Florence 123 Accademia di Belle Arti, Florence 126, 127 Accademia di Belle Arti, Venice foundation 188 museum 188 painting exhibition 189–90 painting gallery 188 aesthetic appreciation, vs artistic eroticism 53 aesthetic philosophy, Kant 34, 35, 150 aesthetic value, and emotional resonance 41 Aguado, Alexandre-Marie, purchase of Penitent Magdalene 257 Albert of Saxony, Prince, Duke of Teschen 31 Albrizzi, Isabella Teotocchi 127, 144, 145, 149 Alison, Archibald 108 Amiens, Peace of (1802–1803) 104, 107, 125 Anatomical Venus 167, 167–8, 169, 174 see also Susini anatomy of sculpture 151–2, 154–6, 156–9, 158–9, 160–1, 162, 163–4, 164–5, 166–8 two sex model 165 see also female anatomy; male anatomy Anderson, James, Museo Chiaramonti 115 animation theories Medusa’s head 94 Pygmalion myth 151–2, 154, 165 see also under Girodet-Trioson antiquity, modernity, relationship 44, 68 Aphrodite of Knidos 150 Apollo Belvedere 31, 40, 84, 86, 172 Canova’s annotations on engraving of 91 displayed in Louvre 107, 110–12 Écorchés (Salvage) 158, 159 interpretation 90 medal 111, 119 plaster cast of 31, 40, 97, 100, 101, 106, 107, 120, 121 seizure by French 102 transparency of marble 100 Triumphant Perseus, comparison 83, 87, 90, 100–1, 106 vein on thigh 155 Aranjuez, Treaty (1801) 125 art, writing, blurring of boundary 67, 68

see also Greek art art conservation, Venetian expertise 192 art galleries 36 art museums 34, 60 and citizenry 256 pedagogical function 96 public space 137 art works appreciation criteria 67 critical responses to 36–7 erotic response to, attempts to mitigate 53 Italian, seizure by French 102, 102, 192 organization by Cicognara 189 recitation of literature while viewing 68 and their setting 118 torchlight viewings 96 artist, as genius 73, 78, 83–4, 236 artistic production, romanticizing 220–5, 227 artistic training, and invention (invenzione) 83 attitudes 169 Audran, Gérard, Proportions du corps humain 162 Baartman, Saartjie (Sarah) as anatomical curiosity 170, 171 and miscegenation fears 142fn85 Bacciochi, Elisa Bonaparte, as Polinnia 185, 186–7, 202, 203 modification to Gabinetto rotondo, Palazzo Pitti 131 patronage of Venus Italica 127 bathing 133, 137, 150 Baudelaire, Charles on Romanticism 254 on sculpture as tiresome 254, 262 Baugean, Jean Jérôme, Departure for France of the Third Convoy of Statues and Italian Works of Art 102 Bell, John (1763–1820) 138, 173 Bell, John (1812–1895) Octoroon 144 Beltrame, Francesco, book on Titian 201 Beltrami, Giovanni 242 The Death of Abel 240 The Last Kiss of Romeo and Juliet 241 Portrait of Count Sommariva in His Villa in Tremezzo (plaster cast) 243

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Benedict, Erastus, on Canova’s monument for Titian 179–81 Benedict XIV, Pope 167 Benjamin, Walter 109 Béranger, Antoine, The Entry into Paris of Works Destined for the Musée Napoléon 103 Berio family, Naples 44 Berio, Francesco Maria, Marchese di Salza 39, 44, 45, 46 criticism of 60 display of Canova’s Venus and Adonis in garden 53, 59 garden, description of 54, 56 Palace on Via Toledo 53, 54, 55 Berio, Giovan Domenico, Marchese di Salza 44, 53 Bernini, Gian-Lorenzo 145 Apollo and Daphne 147 Diderot’s praise of 149 influence on Canova 151 Michelangelo, comparison 147, 149 morbidezza (soft flesh) in sculptures 40, 145, 147, 148, 149, 151 polish, of marble surface 147 The Rape of Persephone (detail) 147, 148 theatricality 208 Bettinelli, Saverio 62 Betzer, Sarah 35 Bianchetti, Cesare, Count 185, 195 Bindman, David 34, 150 Black female body 142–3 anxieties about fecundity 174 Black women, alleged lack of modesty 174 Black people, numbers in England 142 France 142 Italy 142 “Black Venus” figure 143 supposed defects 143–4 Blühm, Andreas 152 blushing and color 152 and female modesty 154 symbol for the living body 152 and whiteness 154 Boccapaduli, Marchesa 51, 56, 61, 149 Boilly, Louis-Léopold Napoleon Honoring the Sculptor Cartellier 217, 219 The Studio of Jean Antoine Houdon (1741–1828) 78 Bombardini, Giuseppe, “La Polinnia di Canova” 191 Bonnet, Louis-Marin, La Toilette 135 Borsato, Giuseppe Commemoration of Canova in the Scuola Grande della Carità 190, 191 Leopoldo Cicognara…Canova Tomb 181

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Boselli, Orfeo, Osservazioni sulla scultura antica 74 Bossi, Giuseppe 103–4 Boucher, François, The Toilette of Venus 134, 137 boudoir toilette, association 133 Venus Italica displayed in 40, 127, 133 Bourbon rule, Naples 44 Bozhkov, Daniel, Venus and Adonis in situ (drawing) 56, 58 Brancusi, Constantin 260 Broughton, John 192 Cadell, William 200 Cailliès, René, Travels through Central Africa to Timbucktoo 173 Callicrates 70 Calzabigi, Ranieri de’ 46 Camper, Pieter 172 Campo Formio, Treaty (1797) 178, 189 Canova, Antonio apprenticeship 95 Bernini’s influence 151 carving methods 68 carving tools 64 critical responses to works 36 criticism, response to 34 cultural roles 23 debates 39 display settings of works 22, 28, 31, 33, 61 exhibition strategies 24, 38 exhibitions of works 21, 38 final touch (l’ultima mano) 81 as genius 63, 81, 127, 130, 173, 179 Grand Tour (1789–1790) 24 hair, styling after sculptures 169–70 Inspector General of the Fine Arts of the Papal States 23, 105, 115 and Kantian aesthetic philosophy 35 legacy 263 lighting of sculptures 27 marble carving as “real flesh” (vera carne) 24, 145, 212 Marchese d’Ischia 115 medal portrait 119 and modern conceptions of sculpture 22 and modernist “white cube” aesthetic 22 multiple readings of works 38 neoclassical works 21 painterly sensibility 208–9 papal commissions 43 perfectionism 24 placement of works, involvement in 25, 28 plagiarism, accusation of 101 political astuteness 23

Index

popularity 23 portrait 22, 81 as Pygmalion (modern) 24, 145, 206, 233, 238 in Rome 95–6 rotating bases of works 21, 26, 33, 100, 129, 169, 209 sculptural production 221–324, 145, 206, 233, 238 secures return of looted art works to Rome 112, 114–15, 114 sources of inspiration 84 studio 24, 33, 36, 80, 81 as exhibition space 97, 98–9, 99–101 surface values 35, 38 temples, placement of works in 28, 29, 47, 51, 56 Thorvaldsen, comparison 154 Titian admirer of 179, 200 monument for 179–81 “Venetianeness” 179 and the Veneto 177–9 as viewer 95–6 viewers, relationship with 33–4 working processes 24, 40, 61, 62–4, 73 see also works (Canova) Capitoline Museum 36, 69, 96, 112, 203 Capodimonte porcelain factory, Naples 44 Carey, David 251 Carnesecchi, Francesco, Impressions of Intaglios after the Statuary of Canova 244 Carradori, Francesco, Elementary Instructions for Students of Sculpture 74 illustration 77 carving tools 64, 75–6 Casid, Jill 248 Castone, Carlo see Rezzonico, Count Cavaceppi, Bartolomeo Raccolta d’antiche statue 74 restoration work 77, 99 studio 79, 97 Cellini, Benvenuto 73 Perseus with the Head of Medusa 89 and Canova’s Triumphant Perseus 87, 90 Charpentier, Toussaint von 121 Cheselden, William female skeleton 166 Osteographia 165 Chiarottini, Francesco, Canova’s Studio in Via San Giacomo 77, 80 Cicogna, Emanuele Antonio 190–1, 202 Cicognara, Leopoldo 40, 122, 155, 184–5, 213 arrogance 204 on Assumption of the Virgin (Titian) 197, 200 dedication to Venetian art 183, 194 director, Accademia di Belle Arti 183

285

Elogio di Tiziano Vecellio 181, 183 Lettera sulla statua…la musa Polinnia 202 oratory 201–2 organization of Venetian art works 189 on Polinnia 205–6 portrait 182 self-promotion 195 Clement XIII, Pope 43 Clement XIV, Pope 43 Codex Urbinas (1270) 208 Coindet, J., Histoire de la peinture en Italie 154, 253 collecting and becoming process 236, 238 and self-realization 238, 255 Collins, Jeffrey, on museums 96 Colomb, Joseph Romain 133 color and blushing 152 and collapse of racial difference 144 and flesh debate 145 threat to connoisseurship 140–1 status of sculpture 140 Venus Italica 139 see also skin color Colt Hoare, Richard 195 Coltmann, Viccy 69 connoisseurship models of 71 threat of color to 140–1 copying, imitation, tension 84, 122, 260 Correggio, Penitent Magdalene Reading (lost) 225, 227 Cousin, Victor 252–3 Creuze de Lesser, Augustin 139–40, 155 cultural patrimony changing ideas of 107–12 loss to Rome 102 Venice 188–92 d’Ancora, Gaetano 66 David, Jacques-Louis 23, 150, 220 Cupid and Psyche 242 de Condillac, Abbé, Treatise on the Sensations 152 de Genlis, Madame, Dictionnaire critique et raisonné des etiquettes 133 de Kératry, Auguste Hilarion 236, 251 de Latouche, Henri 139, 254 de Stäel, Madame 254 Degas, Edgar, paintings of bathing women 137 Dejuinne, François-Louis, Girodet painting “Pygmalion and Galatea” 237, 238 Delatouche, Henri 139 Delecluze, Étienne-Jean 235

286 

Demin, Giovanni, Painting Honored 116–17, 118 Denon, Vivant 107, 111, 125, 219, 227 d’Este, Antonio 51, 56, 67, 68, 78, 80, 208 Dibdin, Thomas, on Penitent Magdalene 248–9, 251 Diderot, Denis Bernini, praise of 149 Dessein, Proportions de la Venus de Médicis 160 Encyclopédie 74, 76, 160, 162 Dies, Albert Christoph, The Temple of Leopoldine with Lake 28, 29 dissection 155, 165, 167, 172 Donatello 183 The Penitent Magdalene 224–5, 224 Ducos, Basile-Joseph 155 on Canova’s Venus Italica 155, 172 Duncan, Carol 256 Duquesnel, Amédée 253 Eaton, Charlotte 36, 109, 110, 117–18, 121, 141 Edwards, Pietro 192, 194 emotional resonance, and aesthetic value 41 England, Black people in 142 Eustace Chetwode, John, Rev 104, 106, 109, 110 execution (esecuzione) 37, 40, 43, 61, 67, 71, 72, 78, 81, 83, 223, 259 Canova’s 63–4, 122, 149, 260 and invention (invenzione) 40, 43, 61, 72, 81, 83, 122, 149, 223, 259–60 expression and individuality 228 meaning of term 228 Penitent Magdalene 227, 228, 230, 231, 247, 249–50, 253–4, 262 Fabrin, Victorin 227 Falier, Giovanni 59 Falier, Giuseppe 96 Farago, Claire 206–7 Farnese Hercules 31, 97, 99, 156, 158 Felibien, André, Principes de l’architecture, de la sculpture 74, 75 female anatomy 160–1, 163–4, 166–8 interiors 165 skeleton 166 skeletons 165 study of 164–5 female modesty and blushing 154 and female orgasm 175 Fend, Mechthild 142, 154 Ferdinand III, Grand Duke 125, 127 Ferdinand IV, King of Naples 45–6, 53

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

Fernow, Carl Ludwig 34, 97, 100, 101, 139, 151 Flaxman, John 109 flesh, depiction of 24, 40 see also soft flesh Florence Accademia di Belle Arti 126, 127 Accademia delle Arti del Disegno 123 and Renaissance culture 123 return of art works 127 return of Venus de’Medici 127 wax collections 169 see also Palazzo Pitti; Uffizi Gallery Fontana, Pietro, engraving of Canova’s Polinnia 210 Forbes, James 111 Forsyth, Joseph 104, 105–6, 139 Foscolo, Ugo 149 France Black people in 142 sculpture in 217 seizure of Italian art works 102, 102, 192 Francesco I de’Medici, Grand Duke 123 Francis I of Austria, Princess Carolina Augusta of Bavaria, marriage 184 The French Artist Mourning the Chances of War 113 Friedländer, Hermann 120, 195, 224 Galatea 152, 233, 234, 236, 237, 238 Galiffe, James 121, 172 Galleria and Museo Chiaramonti 23, 31, 115, 115, 116, 117, 118 lunettes 115–16 Galleria degli Uffizi see Uffizi Gallery Gardiner, Marguerite, Countess of Blessington 137–8, 147, 201 Gargallo, Tommaso Alcune annotazioni ad una lettera di Dorillo Dafneio 65–6 critique of 66 feud with Count Rezzonico 66–8, 71, 72, 259 portrait 65 Genga, Bernardino, Anatomia per uso et intelligenza del disegno 156–7, 157, 162, 164, 164 genius artist as 73, 78, 83–4, 236 Canova as 63, 81, 127, 130, 173, 179 Géricault, Théodore, Raft of the Medusa 233, 235 Gilroy-Ware, Cora 143 Giordani, Pietro 178 Panegyric (to Canova) 155 Girodet-Trioson, Anne-Louis 154 François-Louis Dejuinne, Girodet painting “Pygmalion and Galatea” 237, 238, 239

287

Index

Pygmalion and Galatée 233, 234, 235–6, 246, 256 enamel after 239 love theme 236 trinity concept 236 The Sleep of Endymion 238 Giuli, Luigia, Canova’s housekeeper 47, 51 Giustiniani, Vincenzo, Discourse on Sculpture 73–4 Goffen, Rona 207 Gozlan, Léon, on loss of Penitent Magdalene to France 257–8 Grand Tour Canova 24 Naples 43 Uffizi Gallery, Florence 123 and viewing conditions for art works 35 Greek art, as paradigm of perfection 84 Hamilton, Emma 169 Hamilton, William 46 Hamilton, William Richard 116 Hayez, Francesco Allegory of the Return to Rome of the Works Plundered from the Papal States 116, 116 intaglio after The Last Kiss of Romeo and Juliette 241, 242 Sculpture Honored 116, 117 Hayter, George 200 Heath, William, A Pair of Broad Bottoms 171 Heine, Heinrich 150 Hemans, Felicia 119 Herculaneum, discovery (1738) 44 Herder, Johann Gottfried 140 Hillard, George Stillman 131 Hogarth, William, Time Smoking a Picture 196 Honour, Hugh 126 Houdon, Jean Antoine, studio 74, 78 Hunt, Leigh 172 Iacub, Marcela 137 illusionism 204, 206, 212 sculpture 209 imitation and Canova’s Triumphant Perseus 95 copying, tension 84, 122, 260 as creative practice 83–4, 86–7, 90, 93–5 doctrine of 84, 90, 100 and invention (invenzione) 84 meaning 84 as plagiarism 101 Winckelmann’s influence 84, 122 Inglis, Henry David 252

invention (invenzione) and artistic training 83 and execution (esecuzione) 40, 43, 61, 72, 81, 83, 122, 149, 223, 259–60 and imitation 84 Marchesini on 62 see also imitation Italy Black people in 142 fragmentation (18c) 38 French invasions 38 seizure of art works by French 102, 102 Jameson, Anna, Diary of an Ennuyé 130 Johns, Christopher 38, 228 Johnson, James 173 Jollain, Nicolas-René, After the Bath 137 Jombert, Charles-Antoine, Method for Learning Drawing 162 Kant, Immanuel, aesthetic philosophy 34, 35, 150 Kiesewetter, Johann 120 Kotzebue, Augustus von 54, 106–7 La Specola 167 anatomical conventions 169 Anatomical Venus in 167, 167, 168, 174 Lafont, Anne 141 Landon, Charles-Paul 235 Laocoön 114, 116, 118, 231, 254 anatomy drawing (Genga) 156, 157, 158 in the Louvre 27, 102, 107, 108 medal, Musée Napoléon 111, 125 by torchlight 27 in the Vatican Museums 120 Laqueur, Thomas 164 Lawrence, Thomas, Portrait of the Italian Sculptor Antonio Canova 22 Le Brun, Charles 228 Lemaistre, J.G. 111 Leonardo da Vinci dissections 155 on painting and sculpture 62, 207–9, 212 Lester, Charles Edwards 172 Lichtenstein, Jacqueline 212 Lipparini, Ludovico, Portrait of Leopoldo Cicognara 182 Litta, Cardinal 104 Louvre 27, 36, 107–12, 246, 256–7 La salle des saisons au Louvre (Robert) 108 looted Italian art works in 102, 104, 116–19, 189, 190, 192

288 

Venus de’Medici in 123–4, 150 Venus Italica (Canova), intended for 127 see also Musée Napoléon Lucchesi Palli, Giuseppe 46, 48, 51, 155, 172 Ludovico I di Bourbon-Parma 125 McClellan, Andrew 107 male anatomy 171 marble plaster, comparison 100 as subtractive medium 221 marble carving 73 as “real flesh” (vera carne) 24, 145, 212 marble surface penetrability 155 as skin 154 Marchesini, Marcello 61, 71, 72 on Canova’s flash of inspiration 63 on Canova’s Venus and Adonis 48, 50 on Canova’s working processes 62–3, 73 on invention (invenzione) 62 Matthews, Henry 121, 131 Medici dynasty, end of 125 Medici, Gian Gastone de’, death 125 Melzi, Francesco 207, 208 Messbarger, Rebecca 169 Michelangelo Buonarotti 87, 149, 183, 220 competition with painting (paragone) 207 St Matthew (detail) 146 unf inished quality of work (non-finito) 147, 262 Vasari’s account of 72, 73, 81 Miel, F.A.M. 235–6 Milizia, Francesco 97, 140 Milton, Henry 36–7, 38, 107, 108–9, 110 Minimalism 34 miscegenation, fear of, and skin color 142 Missirini, Melchior 122, 208 poem on Venus Italica 145 modernity, antiquity, relationship 44, 68 modesty Black women, alleged lack of 174 Canova’s 28, 46, 100, 126 false, Venus Italica 131 and female orgasm 175 feminine 154 public 137 see also blushing Moore, Henry 260 Moore, Thomas 172, 249 morbidezza see soft flesh Morgan, Sydney, Lady 54–6, 172, 200, 248, 250, 251

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

motherhood, idealization of 169, 175 Musée Napoléon 102 Apollo Belvedere medal 111 desacralization project 230 Laocoön medal 111 looted sculptures 107–8 organization of 107 Venus de’Medici 125 see also Louvre Museo Chiaramonti see Galleria and Museo Chiaramonti Museo Pio-Clementino 23, 27, 31, 36, 69, 96, 126 absence of original works 105–6 Octagonal Courtyard 105, 105 Triumphant Perseus 83, 103, 106, 120–1 plaster substitutes for marble originals 106, 107 museums attendance 36 Collins on 96 see also art museums; Vatican Museums Myssok, Johannes 87 Naginski, Erica 228 Naples artistic heritage 44, 46 autonomous kingdom 44 Berio family 44 Bourbon rule 44 Capodimonte porcelain factory 44 Golden Age 43–4 Grand Tour destination 43 National Gallery, London 36 Natoire, Charles Joseph, Life Class at the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture 85 Nelson, Charmaine 143 Nichols, Thomas 144 Nicolas, Auguste 236 Nicolaus II Esterházy 28–9 Nobile, Pietro, architect 29, 31 Plan for Temple for the Maria Christina Monument, Vienna (unrealized) 32 Omaggio exhibition 185, 188, 210 originality accusation that Canova lacked 122, 130, 149 debates about 260–1 Penitent Magdalene 223, 228, 253 Ovid, Metamorphoses 151, 152, 233 Padiyar, Satish 34 paint, on sculptures, controversies 139–40

289

Index

painterliness Penitent Magdalene 221, 222, 227, 228 sculptural production 221 painting Leonardo da Vinci on 62 as poetry 206 sculpture, conflict (paragone) 41, 62, 74, 177, 207–8, 212–15, 261–2 Palazzo Pitti, Gabinetto Rotondo 131, 132, 137, 203 Paoletti, Bartolomeo & Pietro, miniature plaster casts 242, 245 Paoletti, Pietro, Canova Presenting to Pius VII the Monuments of Italian Glory 114 paragone 41, 62, 74, 177, 207–8, 212–15, 261–2 Parisian Salon 36, 41, 127, 217, 218, 219–20, 229–30, 231, 233, 247, 248, 249, 252 Pasquin, Antoine Claude 138, 150 pasquinades 104 Patch, Thomas, A Gathering of Dilettanti around the Medici Venus 162 pedestals see under sculpture Petit-Radel, Philippe 195 Pino, Paolo 207 Pio Clementino see Museo Pio-Clementino Pius VI, Pope 102 Pius VII, Pope purchase of Triumphant Perseus 103–4 return from exile 115 plagiarism, imitation as 101, 122 Planche, Gustave 253 plaster, marble, comparison 100 polychromy 139, 140, 145, 149, 155, 224 Pompeii, discovery (1748) 44 Potts, Alex 33–4 Praxiteles 39, 70, 144, 173 Cnidian Venus 70 Pressburg, Peace of (1805) 178 proportions female skeletons 166 Venus de’Medici 160–1, 165 Venus Italica 172 Penitent Magdalene 228 study of 84, 162 Prud’hon, Pierre-Paul, Portrait of Gian-Battista Sommariva 232, 233, 238, 242, 243 Puccini, Tommaso 125, 126 Pygmalion myth 234, 237, 246, 251 and animation theories 151–2, 154, 165, 247, 261 Canova as modern Pygmalion 24, 145, 206, 233, 238 and fashion trends 169–70 and Romantic creation 235–6

and soft flesh 152 in theater and fine arts 152 transformative myth 153 Quadri, Antonio, Otto giorni a Venezia 179 Quatremère de Quincy, Antoine-Chrysosthôme 34, 147, 192, 208, 219 on Canova’s Penitent Magdalene 227, 235 on Canova’s sculptural production 147, 221–3 correspondence with Canova 73, 84 Lettres de Miranda 102 racial difference, and skin color 141–2 Raoux, Jean, Pygmalion 153 Raphael 143, 200, 207, 235 Galatea 71 The Transfiguration 102, 114, 117, 118, 195, 197, 198 Rause, Amelia 169 Reade, John Edmund 130 reception theory, sculpture 38 Redhead Yorke, Henry 111 Reinolds, Jean-Baptiste 106 Reynolds, Joshua 195 Discourses 140 Rezzonico, Count (Carlo Castone) on Canova’s execution (esecuzione) 63–4 on Canova’s working processes 59, 61–2 ekphrastic writing 68 feud with Gargallo 66–8, 71, 72, 259 Lettera di Filalete Nemesiano a Don Limone 66, 69, 71 portrait 63 Rezzonico, Ludovico 59 Rigaud, Jacques, View of the Queen’s Theatre from the Rotunda 60 Robert, Cyprien 151 Robert, Hubert, La salle des saisons au Louvre 108 Roberti, Tiberio, Count 97 Rockwell, Peter 147 Rodin, Auguste, and legacy of Penitent Magdalene 262 Romanticism 236 Baudelaire on 254 Penitent Magdalene 229, 254 Rome art market 96 center of artistic training (18c) 40 loss of cultural patrimony 102 Rosenthal, Angela 154 Royal Academy, London 36 Royal Museum for Physics and Natural History see La Specola

290 

Salvage, Jean-Galbert Anatomie du gladiateur combattant 158, 159 Écorchés after the Apollo Belvedere 158, 159 Sartori, Giovanni Battista 87 Schlegel, August Wilhelm von 253, 254, 255 Schmidt, Carl, Theseus Temple by Pietro von Nobile 31 cross-section 31 Scott, John 110, 111, 120 editor London Magazine 109, 111 Scrofani, Saverio 230–1 sculptural criticism 74 sculptural production 73, 74, 77 Canova’s 221–3 painterliness 221 realities 78, 80, 81 see also carving tools sculpture alleged anti-intellectualism of 62–3 display modes 59 establishing supremacy of 201–4, 206–9, 212–15 in France 217 ideal viewpoint 208 illusionism 209 installations 24, 59, 61 Leonardo da Vinci on 62 modern 262–3 as a modern art 252–8 painted 139 painting, conflict (paragone) 41, 62, 177, 207–8, 212–13, 261–2 pedestals 24, 45, 61, 103, 162 empty 106, 125, 126 with turntables 25–6, 28, 33, 35, 100, 129, 169, 209 physical engagement with 34, 35, 53, 61 reception, in late 18c 34 reception theory 38 temples for housing 57, 58, 59, 60 touching 61 viewer’s engagement with 39, 61 waxed surface 21, 24, 65, 138, 139, 149, 154, 172 whiteness, desirability of 138, 141 writing about, difficulties 260 writings on 73–4 see also anatomy of sculpture self-realization, and collecting 238, 255 Selva, Giannantonio 28, 45, 47, 80, 179, 188, 213 Tempietto Dedicated to Ceres 56, 57, 59 Simond, Louis 35, 121, 139, 151 Simonetti, Michelangelo 105 skin, marble surface as 154–5

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

skin color fear of miscegenation 142 and racial difference 141–2, 154 and slavery 142 see also Black female body; Black people; “Black Venus” figure; whiteness slavery, and skin color 142 Sloan, James 183–4 Soemmering, Samuel Thomas von 165 soft flesh (morbidezza) 145, 169 Apollo and Daphne (Bernini) 147 Bernini’s sculptures 40, 145, 147, 148, 149, 151 damage to Canova’s reputation 149, 151 medicalization of 175 origins of quality 147 and Pygmalion myth 152 Rape of Persephone (Bernini) 148 real vs ideal, confusion 149, 261 Venus de’Medici 164 Venus Italica 145, 147, 155 Sommariva, Giambattista 41, 219, 227, 228 art collection 231, 233, 239, 246 commissioning activity 238 creative agency 238 in Dejuinne’s Girodet painting “Pygmalion and Galatea” 237, 238 enamels of paintings commissioned 238, 239 honorary Frenchman 255 personification of Penitent Magdalene 247 Terpsichore 245–6, 246 portrait 232, 243 reinvention of self 246–7 self-image 245 Sommariva, Luigi 256 Starke, Mariana 195 Stendahl, 262 on Penitent Magdalene 253 Stewart, Susan 255 Subba, Letterio, Antonio Canova in His Studio 197, 199 Susini, Clemente, Anatomical Venus 167–8, 169 tableaux vivants 170 tactility (touch) 53, 61, 64, 140, 145 Venus and Adonis 51, 149 Venus Italica 149–50 Taylor, Charles 228 temples, circular, for housing sculptures 57, 58, 59, 60 Theocritus 70 Thorvaldsen, Bertel 23, 34, 39 Canova, comparison 154

Index

Ticknor, George 200 Titian admired by Canova 179 Assumption of the Virgin 40, 193 Cicognara on 197, 200 film coating 195 first engraving after 200 luminosity 200, 201 as masterpiece 201 Polinnia, juxtaposition 204, 212, 214 restoration 194, 195, 200, 201 Beltrame’s book on 201 Canova’s model monument to 179, 180 Venus and Adonis 48 toilette 134 and bathing 133, 135 public nature of 133, 136, 137 La Toilette intime (anon) 136, 137 Tolentino, Treaty (1796) 102 Tomitano, Giulio Bernardo 201 torchlight, and viewing art works 27, 33, 35, 56, 59, 61, 64, 67, 93, 94, 96 touch see tactility Tuscany, Austrian rule 125 Uffizi Gallery 36 Grand Tour destination 123 Venus de’Medici 128 Venus Italica 36, 123, 127–9, 129, 149, 178 works designated Florentine property 125 works saved from French 125 Valery, M. (Antoine Claude Pasquin), Historical, Literary, and Artistic Travels in Italy 138, 150 van Eyck, Caroline 34 Vanvitelli, Luigi 53 Vasari, Giorgio 195, 207 on Michelangelo 72, 73, 81 Vite 73 Vatican Museums 23, 96, 101, 104, 106, 107, 117, 119 visitors’ remarks 104–5 Veneto, and Canova 177–9 Venice Austrian rule 183–4 celebration of cultural patrimony 188–92 claim to Canova 178 Venus and Adonis Canova see under works (Canova) legend 47 Titian 48 Venus de’Medici 40, 68, 84, 124, 164 A Gathering of Dilettanti around the Medici Venus 162

291

analysis of anatomical proportions 161 Dessein, Proportions de la Venus de Médicis (Diderot) 160 in Musée Napoléon 125 proportions 160–1 return to Florence 127 soft flesh 164 in Uffizi Gallery 128 Venus Italica, comparison 129–31 Véron, Eugène 254, 262 Verrochio, Andrea del 207 Vesalius, Andreas, De humani corporis fabrica libri septum 156 Visconti, Ennio Quirino, art works catalogue 110 Vitali, Pietro, “The Gallery of Hercules and Lychas in the Palazzo Torlonia” 30 voyeurism and Venus and Adonis 53 and Venus Italica 150 Waldie, Jane 121 wax, on sculptural surfaces see under sculpture wax collections, Florence 167, 169 Wheeler, Roxann 141 whiteness as beauty standard 144 and blushing 154 and femininity 170 desirability of in sculpture 141 Eurocentrism of 141 Winckelmann on 140, 141 Williams, Hugh William 120–1 Wilson, James 173 Winckelmann, Johann 69, 90, 93, 122 on Apollo Belvedere 93 History of the Art of Antiquity 84, 140 influence on imitation 84, 122 Reflections on the Imitation of Greek Works 84 on whiteness 140, 141 works (Canova) Beatrice 182 Bozzetto for Elisa Baciocchi Bonaparte as the Muse Polinnia 187 Creugas, Triumphant Perseus, and Damoxenes (photo) 26 Cupid and Psyche 25, 26, 45 Eurydice 59 Hebe 139, 144, 155 tinting 220 Hercules and Lychas 28, 31, 98 Ideal Head 139 Madame Mère 217 Model for Portrait Bust of Elisa Baciocchi 202

292 

Monument to Angelo Emo 209 Monument to Maria Christina of Austria 29 Monument to Titian (model) 179, 180 Napoleon as Mars 122 Orpheus and Eurydice 59 Palamedes 233 Penitent Magdalene 41, 139, 218 aesthetic issues 230, 231 boudoir space 248 Christian sentiment 228–9, 231, 253 clay model 223 critical acclaim 227–8 critical reviews 219–20, 230 democratic appeal 252 detail 225 display in Sommariva’s Paris townhouse 247–51 emotional response from viewers 229, 251–2, 254 exhibition at 1808 Salon (France) 217, 247 expression 227, 228, 230, 231, 247, 249–50, 253–4, 262 feet 250, 250 and French cultural identity 258 as French national treasure 255 in Genova 257 modernity 253, 255 painterliness 221, 222, 227 personification by Sommariva 247 pictorial sources 227 plaster cast 245 private purchase 256–7 Quatremère de Quincy on 235 rear view 226 and Rodin legacy 262 Romanticism 254 rouge on lips and cheeks 139, 220 sense of self 229 tinting 220–1, 224 Perseus with the Head of Medusa 90, 92–4 see also Triumphant Perseus Polinnia 40, 155, 187, 199 Assumption (Titian), juxtaposition 204, 212, 214 Bombardini’s poem 191 Cicognara on 205–6 criticism of 202–3 Elisa Bonaparte Bacciochi as 185, 186–7, 202, 203 engraving 210 origins 185 posture 203

Exhibiting Antonio Canova

reception 204 rotating base 209 side view 205 viewers’ contemplation of 212 Psyche 28 Seated Woman 211 Terpsichore 232, 233, 246 The Three Graces 28, 30, 139 Theseus and the Centaur 29 Theseus and the Minotaur 43, 86 Triumphant Perseus 31, 40, 88, 92 Apollo Belvedere, comparison 83, 87, 90, 100–1, 106 and Cellini’s Perseus 87, 89, 90 detail 94, 95 epitome of neoclassicism 87 and ideal beauty 90 and imitation doctrine 95 narrative 90 in Pio-Clementino museum 83, 103, 106, 120 playfulness 95 reception history 87 responses to 101 second version (Perseus with the Head of Medusa) 90, 92–4 in Vatican 120 Venus and Adonis 39, 43, 45, 45, 50, 208 and ancient texts 70 criticism of 59 detail 49, 52 illusion of flesh 51 poems about 69 presentation in Berio’s garden 46–7, 53, 56, 59 rear view 50 rotating pedestal 45, 49, 50, 52, 129 in situ drawing (Bozhkov) 56, 58 surface treatment 65 tactility 149, 155 in temple 39, 47, 51, 56, 58 viewer’s engagement with 51, 68 and voyeurism 53 yellow tint (Venus) 65, 139, 144, 155 Venus Italica 36, 40, 123, 124 in boudoir and toilette space 40, 127, 133 buttocks 173 clinical gaze 175–6 color 139 criticism of 130–1, 137–8, 149, 172–3 Ducos on 172 in Louvre 123 Missirini’s poem 145 modesty, false 131

Index

opera dancers, comparison 137–8 paid for by Napoleon 127 Palazzo Pitti placement in 131, 133 removal to 127–9 private ablutions on public display 137 proportions 172 pudica pose 174 reception 126 replacement for Venus de’Medici 126 reproductive potential 173–4, 175 soft flesh 145, 147, 155

293

tactility 149–50 torso and side view 130 turntable placement 126 vein on shoulder 155, 172 Venus de’Medici, comparison 129–31, 138, 149 and voyeurism 150 writing, art, blurring of boundary 67, 68 Zix, Benjamin, The Emperor Napoleon and Empress Marie-Louise 27 Zulian, Girolamo 28, 179