The Metropolitan Museum's Aphrodite
The marble Aphrodite at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, is a close replica of the Venus de' Medici. The pose of the head is not in doubt, for it did not break off when other breaks occurred, in which the arms were irrevocably lost. On the plinth is the left foot, with part of the dolphin-and-tree-trunk support, and a trace of the missing right foot, restored by a cast, for the sculpture was in two sections, which were joined by casts taken of the Venus de' Medici's lower legs. For dating the replicas, attention is focussed on the minor details of the dolphins that were added by the copyists, in which stylistic conventions come to the fore: the Metropolitan dates its Aphrodite of the Medici type to the Augustan period.
The Metropolitan Aphrodite was in the collection of Count von Harbuval genammt Chamaré in Silesia, whose progenitor Count Schlabrendorf made the Grand Tour and corresponded with Johann Joachim Winckelmann.
Read more about this topic: Venus De' Medici
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