Csornay Boldizsár - Dobos Zsuzsa - Varga Ágota - Zakariás János szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 100. (Budapest, 2004)

URBACH, ZSUZSA: Ein flämischer ikonographischer Bildtypus im italienischen Quattrocento. Bemerkungen zur Studie von Éva Eszláry

HORSEMAN KILLING A BULL AND HORSEMAN PURSUING A BOAR TWO SMALL BRONZES BY DAMIANO CAPPELLI IN THE BUDAPEST MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS John Pope-Henessy in his review on the catalogue of the Old Sculpture Collection of the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts mentions that the author, Jolán Balogh, tends to overrate some pieces of works in the collection.

1 The case, however, seems to be just the opposite with respect to Cat. Nos. 242 and 243: Jolán Balogh attributed the two bronze statuettes depicting hunting scenes to Francesco Fanelli (active ca. 1608-1661), who was born in Florence but later worked mainly in England.

2 The statuettes to this day are exhibited in the Baroque Hall of the Museum of Fine Arts under the name of Fanelli. In the last three decades since the publication of Jolán Balogh's catalogue, numerous studies have appeared which give us a more accurate picture about seventeenth-century Italian bronze sculpture. Therefore, it is high time to reappraise the attribution of the two Budapest small bronzes.

3 The Horseman Killing a Bull bronze statuette in the Museum of Fine Arts renders that dramatic moment when the horseman is about to stick the collapsing bull (fig. 38). The horseman of the other small bronze is modelled even more dynamically in the action of pursuing a wild boar (fig. 39). Both statuettes stand on an original gilded pedestal forming a semi-circle on both sides. The Museum of Fine Arts acquired the statuettes from architect Gedeon Gerlóczy in 1959. Until 1934 these artworks were a part of the eminent Kohner Collection, purchased by the 1 J. Pope-Henessy, "Italian Sculpture - Budapest and Paris," Apollo 102 (1975), 474-75. 2 J. Balogh, Katalog der ausländischen Bildwerke des Museums der Bildenden Künste in Budapest, 2 vols., Budapest 1975, cat. 242, 243. Horseman Pursuing a Boar, inv. no. 59.3, bronze, height: 28 cm, length: 42 cm; Horseman Killing a Bull, inv. no. 59.4, bronze, height: 28.5 cm, length: 29 cm. 3 After the pioneering work of Klaus Lankheit (Florentinische Barockplastik: Die Kunst am Hofe der Letzten Medici, 1670-1743, Munich 1962), see A. Radcliffe, "Ferdinando Tacca, the Missing Link in Florentine Baroque Bronzes," in Kunst des Barock in der Toskana, ed. Italienische Forschungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz, vol. 3, no. 9, Munich 1976, 14-23; A. Brook, "Rediscovered Works of Ferdinando Tacca for the Former High Altar of S. Stefano al Ponte Vecchio," in Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz 39 (1985), 111-28; id., "La scultura fiorentina tra il Giambologna e il Foggini," in Ii Seicento Fiorentino. Arte a Firenze da Ferdinando I. a Cosimo III, exh. cat., Florence 1986, 71-76; G. Pratesi ed., Repertorio della scultura fiorentina del Seicento e del Settecento, Turin 1993.