ANTIQUE MARBLE SCULPTURE.
A WHITE MARBLE FIGURE OF CYPARISSUS
BY FRANCESCO POZZI (1779-1844)
Signed & Dated: F. Pozzi Fe., Roma, 1822.
This carved marble sculpture shows the kneeling figure of a youth, his right hand raised to his forehead in a gesture of grief, and his left hand supporting the figure of a wounded stag.
The mythological subject depicted is taken from Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Book X): On the island of Chios, in the valley of Cartea, lived a wondrous stag, sacred to the nymphs there. This stag had no fear of people he knew, and would offer his neck even for strangers to pet, but he was especially loved by Cyparissus, the fairest youth of Chios, son of King Telaphus, who would lead the stag to fresh pasture and to the clearest springs, and garland him. One day, Cyparissus accidentally struck his beloved stag with a javelin, and when he saw it dying from the deep wound, he could not bear it, and resolved on death. Apollo begged him to hold his grief in check, but the youth implored the Gods to let him mourn forever, and when his life force was spent by long weeping, his limbs began to take on a greenish hue, and he became a cypress tree. Apollo, groaning with sorrow, said: “You shall be mourned sincerely by me, surely as you mourn for others, and forever you shall stand in grief, where others grieve”.
Alternative dates of 1790 and 1874 have been proposed for Pozzi’s birth and death (Dizionario degli Scultori Italiani dell’Ottocento,1989 (pages 184-185) by A. Panzetta. He was born on the island of Elba and studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, winning a prize in 1816 to further his studies in Rome where he was an associate of both Canova and Thorwaldsen. It was while in Rome that he carved the present figure. In 1823 he completed a statue of Filippo Colonna for the church of S. Apostoli, and was also appointed professor of sculpture at the Academy in Florence, exhibiting there his work of Latona with her children Apollo & Diana. Other works from this period are Baccante (1820) at the Accademia di Belle Arti and Danzatrice (1821) at the Pitti Palace. His patrons included the Borbone of Lucca and Prince Borghese in Quinto, for whom he made monuments in the churches of S. Croce and S. Marco in Florence. For Livorno he carved a colossal statue of Ferdinando III, Grand Duke of Tuscany (1831-47), and his Farinata degli Uberti of1844, the Ghibelline leader immortalised in Dante’s Inferno, stands in the loggia of the Uffizi Galleries. Other examples of his work are known in collections in England, Russia and Poland. Pozzi was also active as a painter.
Gunnis’ Dictionary of British Sculptors 1660-1851 records a bust of “The Youthful Hercules” by Pozzi at The Vine, Hampshire, and a relief of “Charity” in Cheshire.
The prime marble version of Cyparissus is in the Palazzo Granducale, Lucca, and the original plaster model is now in the Accademia in Florence.
Provenance: The Barbara Piasecka Johnson Collection.Height: 46” (116.80 cm)
Width: 21 ½” (55 cm)
Depth: 39” (99cm)
