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CLODION (CLAUDE MICHEL). Minerva

Minerva. Artist: Clodion (Claude Michel) (French, Nancy 1738-1814 Paris). Culture: French, modeled Italy, Rome. Dimensions: Height: 18 3/4 in. (47.6 cm). Date: 1766. The entertaining French sculptor Claude Michel--called Clodion-- spent nine years in Italy (1762-71), where he attended the French Academy in Rome and studied important collections of antiquities. Instructed by Charles-Joseph Natoire, director of the French Academy, to study sculpture by making clay copies instead of drawing, Clodion soon perfected a type of highly finished small terracotta sculpture popular with eighteenth-century collectors. Minerva combines the features of several ancient marbles, most importantly the Minerva Giustiniani in the Vatican. Clodion depicts the goddess of wisdom and the arts wearing a helmet, Greek chiton and mantle draped over her left shoulder and wrapped around her waist. Her raised right hand once held a spear (now lost). Her lowered left hand steadies a shield with quilted padding and arm straps on the inside; a delicately incised head of Medusa appears on the other side, probably added to the damp clay before finishing, along with Clodion's signature at the base.
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Author:
Title:
Minerva
Caption:
Minerva. Artist: Clodion (Claude Michel) (French, Nancy 1738-1814 Paris). Culture: French, modeled Italy, Rome. Dimensions: Height: 18 3/4 in. (47.6 cm). Date: 1766. The entertaining French sculptor Claude Michel--called Clodion-- spent nine years in Italy (1762-71), where he attended the French Academy in Rome and studied important collections of antiquities. Instructed by Charles-Joseph Natoire, director of the French Academy, to study sculpture by making clay copies instead of drawing, Clodion soon perfected a type of highly finished small terracotta sculpture popular with eighteenth-century collectors. Minerva combines the features of several ancient marbles, most importantly the Minerva Giustiniani in the Vatican. Clodion depicts the goddess of wisdom and the arts wearing a helmet, Greek chiton and mantle draped over her left shoulder and wrapped around her waist. Her raised right hand once held a spear (now lost). Her lowered left hand steadies a shield with quilted padding and arm straps on the inside; a delicately incised head of Medusa appears on the other side, probably added to the damp clay before finishing, along with Clodion's signature at the base.
Technique/material:
TERRACOTTA
Museum:
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Credit:
Album / Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY
Releases:
Model: No - Property: No
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Image size:
3276 x 4094 px | 38.4 MB
Print size:
27.7 x 34.7 cm | 10.9 x 13.6 in (300 dpi)
Keywords: