Terracotta figurine of nude Aphrodite reclining with two Erotes
- Title:
- Terracotta figurine of nude Aphrodite reclining with two Erotes
- Collection:
- Cornell Cast Collection
- Creator:
- Fritz Gurlitt (Gallery) (reproduction)
Unknown (original)
- Photographer:
- Mericle, Danielle
- Date:
- ca. 1890-1900
19th century (probably)
- Site:
- Berlin, Germany (reproduction)
probably Greece (original) - Location:
- Goldwin Smith Hall (Ground floor showcase), Cornell University
previously, 726 University Avenue
Berlin, Germany (reproduction)
probably Greece (original) - ID Number:
- CCC_0586
- Accession Number:
- Sage no. 458
Gurlitt 42
458 (sticker on front and underneath), black point sticker
596 - File Name:
- CCC_0586.tif
- Culture:
- Unknown, probably Greek
- Style/Period:
- probably modern, in Hellenistic Greek style
- Work Type:
- casts (sculpture)
- Materials/Techniques:
- terracotta, mold-made replica (sculpture)
terracotta sculpture in the round, mold-made (original) - Subject:
- Tanagra figurines
Aphrodite (Greek deity) - Image View Type:
- overall
- Image View Description:
- from front
- Measurement:
- 20 (with pedestal) x 18.5 (without pedestal) x 20.8 x 10.4 (centimeters, height x height x width x diameter)
- Description:
- This is a terracotta replica of a probable 19th century forgery of a Tanagra figurine. Aphrodite reclines on a drapery-covered couch propping her weight on her right elbow, which rests on a pillow, and looking to her left. She is posed frontally with her hips twisted slightly back. With her left hand, she touches a necklace at her chest from which hangs a teardrop-shaped pendant or amulet, here painted black. Her wavy hair is tied up into a knot. Drapery is wrapped around and hangs from her right leg. Behind her, two small, chubby, winged Erotes lift a large garment to drape over her shoulders. The paint, in various shades of taupe, has been rubbed away in a few patches, perhaps at manufacture. The replica is in otherwise good condition. In his 1885 sales catalog, Gurlitt (no. 42) locates the original of this object at the South Kensington Museum, London (now the Victoria and Albert Museum). The object is not encountered in the Victoria and Albert Museum's online collection database and has yet to be located in South Kensington Museum catalogs. The burial sites in and around the Boeotian town of Tanagra underwent large-scale looting in the 1870s in pursuit of Hellenistic terracotta figurines known then, as now, as Tanagra figurines, or simply as Tanagras. The Hellenistic figurines discovered in the graves there--most commonly depicting women and girls in acts of leisure or daily life, and also depicting Aphrodite, Eros, young men and boys, and grotesque figures--appealed greatly to the sensibilities of the time and quickly became popular among collectors and the general public. By 1873, the Greek government made attempts to control the looting and established official excavations around the area. Smaller-scale grave-robbing continued alongside these less-than-thoroughly documented excavations. In addition to looting, forgery and extensive restoration of these mold-made objects became lucrative practice when demand for the objects was at its highest.
- Notes:
- Items in the Cornell Cast Collection are meant for inventory and reference purposes. Metadata may not be complete in all cases.
- Bibliography:
- Reynold Higgins, Tanagra and the Figurines (London: Trefoil Books, 1986)
I. Kriseleit and G. Zimmer (eds.), Bürgerwelten (Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 1994)
Violaine Jeammet, ed., Tanagras. Figurines for Life and Eternity. The Musée du Louvre's Collection of Greek Figurines (Valencia: Fundación Bancaja, 2010)
Illustrated catalogue of the series of Fritz Gurlitt's Tanagra figures (London: Obach and Co., 1885), no. 42 - Repository:
- Cornell University (current)
London, Victoria and Albert Museum (perhaps?) (original) - Collecting Program:
- Cornell Collections of Antiquities
- Format:
- Image
- Rights:
- The images in the Cornell Collection of Antiquities: Casts are protected by copyright, and the copyright holders are their creators, generally Cornell University Library, Annetta Alexandridis, and Verity Platt. This collection of plaster casts owned by Cornell University was photographed by Cornell University Library, Alexandridis, Platt, and Andreya L. Mihaloew from 2010-2015, with funding from a Digital Collections in Arts and Sciences Grant to Annetta Alexandridis. Cornell is providing access to the materials for research and personal use. The written permission of any copyright and other rights holders is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use that extends beyond what is authorized by fair use and other statutory exemptions. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. Please contact Annetta Alexandridis and Verity Platt for more information about this collection, or to request permission to use these images.