Lot 129: Venus and Cupid with putti

Federico Bianchi (active in Milan, 1638-1719)
Venus and Cupid with putti
oil on panel
49½ x 37 in. (125.7 x 94.2 cm.)

J. Dallinger, Description des Tableaux, et des Pièces de Sculpture, que renferme la Gallerie de son Altesse François Joseph Chef et Prince Regnant de la Maison de Liechtenstein, Vienna, 1780, p. 234, no. 689*.
Sammlungskatalog, MS, Schloss Vaduz, Liechtenstein, 1805, no. 32
G.H., in Neues Archiv für Geschichte, Staatenkunde, Literatur und Kunst, Vienna, 1829, pp. 330-2.
Wiens Kunstsachen, Vienna, 1856, as by Correggio.
G.F. Waagen, Die vornehmsten Kunstdenkmäler in Wien, Vienna, 1866, p. 260, as by Guilio Proccaccini.
J. Falke, Katalog der Fürstlich Liechtensteinischen Bilder-Galerie im Gartenpalais der Rossau zu Wien, Vienna, 1873, p. 9, no. 65.
J. Falke, Katalog der Fürstlich Liechtensteinischen Bilder-Galerie im Gartenpalais der Rossau zu Wien, Vienna, 1885, p. 6, no. 33.
W. Suida, Moderner Cicerone, vol. II, Vienna and Stuttgart, 1904, p. 80.
K. Höss, Fürst Johann II. von Liechtenstein und die bildende Kunst, Vienna, 1908, p. 25.
T. von Frimmel, Lexikon der Wiener Gemäldesammlungen, vol. I, Munich, 1913, p. 83
G. Glück, Die Fürstlich Liechtensteinsche Bildergalerie, Vienna, 1923, no. 6, illustrated.
A. Kronfeld, Führer durch die Fürstlich Liechtensteinsche Gemäldegalerie in Wien, Vienna, 1931, pp. 12-13, no. 33.

(Probably) Franz Josef I, Prince of Liechtenstein, Duke of Troppau and Jägerndorf (1726-1781), published as being in his gallery by J. Dallinger in 1780 (loc. cit.), and by descent in the Garden Palace at Rossau (where recorded by Falke in 1873 and 1885, loc. cit.), until 1927, when moved to the Liechtenstein City Palace, Vienna (inv. no. 118), until 1945, when moved to Schloss Vaduz, Liechtenstein, until the present.

The pupil and later the son-in-law of Ercole Procaccini il Giovane, Federico Bianchi was active mainly in Milan and Varese in the latter half of the 17th century. He also worked in Piedmont, however, and his great success in that region was rewarded by a gold medal given by the Duke of Savoy.

The subject of the sleeping Cupid, his quiver laid by his side, a witty and endearing conceit of classical inspiration, had been treated in sculpture by Michelangelo (1496, once in the collection of Charles I, now untraced) and in painting by artists such as Girolamo Mazzola Bedoli (c. 1555, Chantilly, Musée Condé). Here the subject is enlivened by the compositional and expressive contrast between rest and motion, action and suspense. Venus puts her finger to her lips, as though to hush the viewer whose intrusion might spoil the fun of the two joyful putti -- who, with the complicity of the goddess, are playing with Love's potent arrows.