Lid of a writing case with slight protrusion in chased and g - Lot 97

Lid of a writing case with slight protrusion in chased and gilded bronze. Top panel decorated with two putti holding a shield, trees at the ends, trophy of arms on the ground behind the right putto; framing with a course of fine floral and foliage scrolls interrupted at the center of each long side by a winged term flanked by chimerical animals with caprid heads. High-quality chasing and gilding. Northern Italy, Milan, circa 1550-80 H. 10.8 cm - L. 20.1 cm (filling where the hinges are on the reverse) Works consulted : - R. Coppel Aréizaga, Catálogo de la escultura de época moderna Siglos XVI-XVIII, Madrid, 1988, cat.10, 12 and 16. - J. Warren, Sculpture in Metal, Vol. I, Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture, A Catalogue of the Collection in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 2014, cat.61. This box lid appears to be the only known example to feature this iconography. The lids belonging to writing cases, traditionally attributed to the Paduan school, are all of a different typology: they have no projection, with a central panel featuring two putti with ribbons on either side of a garland in a frame of head-to-tail palmettes and fleurons. The workmanship also differs, this one showing a particular precision and nervousness in the chasing. These characteristics bring it into line with a candlestick in the Ashmolean Museum collections that Jeremy Warren has dated to the mid-16th century (inv. WA 1899.CDEF.B1004, fig.a) and with works from the workshop of Leone Leoni (1509-90), such as the important bronze effigies of Charles V and Empress Isabella in the Prado Museum (inv. E-273, E-271 and E-274). It's true that the chisel used to model the decoration on the Oxford Museum candlestick and on this casket lid has qualities that can only be found in a sculptor and goldsmith like Leoni. We also know from contemporary documents that the workshop of the great Italian Mannerist artist, who ended his life in Milan, produced a number of small bronze objects, including statuettes, medals, plaques, candlesticks and caskets. Warren also cites an inkwell base preserved at the Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe in Hamburg, which he links to this same production and on which we find a fine course of foliage and flowers identical to that on this beautiful lid (inv. 1950-47, fig.b). It is not certain that this one actually belonged to a box that may have remained unfinished. It is certainly due to the quality of its execution that it has been preserved in the image of the most beautiful plates that the Italian Renaissance has provided us with.