Lot 95: - Arrigo Minerbi , Italian 1881-1960 A PORTRAIT OF ELEONORA DUSE white marble

white marble

measurements note 32cm., 12½in.

Born in Ferrara, Arrigo Minerbi was a prolific sculptor who sculpted many busts of prominent Italian. He created bronzes and much reproduced architectural elements in association with the Bondeno firm and executed large public sculpture for cities like Milan and Florence. Minerbi was initially influenced by the Art Nouveau style of Leonardo Bistolfi until he encountered Adolfo Wildt in Milan, after which his work takes on a more modernist approach. The pose of this portrait can also be seen in the Testa di Eleonara Duse (illustrated by Scardino), another portrait of the famous Lombard actress who seems to have been a muse for Minerbi and many other artists of the Ferrarese school. Even in Minerbi's more stylised, later work, an interest in unconventionally composed busts persisted: the raised chin of La Crisalide still reminds us of movement the sculptor achieved in this powerful bust. The tilted back head echoes one of the figures from his Monumento al Medico caduto in guerra in Florence, whose calm air is very much the same.

Alfonso Panzetta has confirmed the attribution of this marble of Eleonora Duse to Arrigo Minerbi (verbal communication).

RELATED LITERATURE
Scardino; Panzetta, vol. 2, p. 582