The Sculpture Museum - Catalog - Page 44
giovanni francesco susini (1585– c. 1653)
10
Florence, 1st half 17th century
The Farnese Bull
After the Antique
Bronze, dark olive patina with traces of translucent lacquer
46.5 cm (18¼ in.) high
38 cm (15 in.) wide
38 cm (15 in.) deep
provenance
Private collection, United Kingdom
fig. 1
Roman, 2nd–3rd century ad, The
Farnese Bull, marble, 370 cm high
Naples, Museo Archeologico Nazionale
Born in Florence towards the end of the sixteenth century, Giovanni Francesco, or
Gianfrancesco, Susini learned the art of bronze casting from his uncle Antonio,
one of the most talented disciples of the undisputed master bronzier of the period,
the great Giambologna (1529–1608). Indeed, the biographer Filippo Baldinucci
(1624–1697) writes in his Notizie on Antonio Susini (ed. Ranalli, 1846, IV, p. 110) that
the sculptor was greatly esteemed by Giambologna, who sent him to Rome to
make copies of the finest statues in that city. Among these was the monumental
marble group referred to as the Farnese Bull, which had been excavated in 1545
in the Baths of Caracalla and had entered the prestigious Farnese collection the
following year, to be restored by Gian Battista Bianchi in 1579 (fig. 1). Antonio
Susini made several bronze statuettes of this ancient marble, though interestingly
Baldinucci describes the model at some length as being one of the works of his
nephew Gianfrancesco, whom the writer knew personally (ed. Ranalli, 1846,
IV, p. 118).
This spectacular bronze group is expertly cast (in several components invisibly
joined together) and chased. The nude parts of the human bodies and the hides
of the little animals are well polished, while the whole surface of the mound
on which the action takes place is treated with a matt punch in neat lines that
carefully follow and emphasize its contours, while one or two areas are left
smooth, by way of contrast.
The group is a massive, hollow cast that conforms inside to the shape of the
mound. To this some figures were attached by shaping the ends of their casting
sprues into tangs, which were then hammered through holes in the mound, for
example beneath the rear legs of the dog, visible from below; or by tapping on a
screw thread, to which a nut may be applied, once it has passed down through a
hole bored in the mound – as, for example, in the complete figure of the attendant
at the rear right corner.
Beneath the collapsed body of Dirce awaiting her punishment, thick iron-wire
armatures project down around some refractory material from the core. Some
rectangular insertions of metal (for example, when seen from below, one more or
less in the centre and others in lower left and upper right corners) are not fixings
