Lot 1: Horse and Rider, Leonardo da Vinci’s (Only Surviving Sculpture on Auction)

Invaluable Auctions ^ | October 30, 2019 | Invaluable

[Swordmaker]

Item Overview

Description: A unique, 21st Century bronze figure cast from a 16th Century beeswax model authenticated as the work of Leonardo da Vinci.

The Original Bee’s Wax Mold by Leonardo’s Own Hand

28 cm x 23.5 cm x 13.35 cm

On October 30th, a unique bronze sculpture by Leonardo da Vinci, will be auctioned at New York's prestigious Pierre Hotel. It is titled simply ''Horse and Rider" (Cavallo e Cavaliere).

The work is cast from a beeswax model hand-carved by Leonardo himself, circa 1508 according to Dr. Carlo Pedretti. Author of over sixty books on the life and work of Leonardo and the Armand Hammer Chair of Leonardo Studies at UCLA, Dr. Pedretti authenticated the statuette in 1985 and documented it in Leonardo Da Vinci In The Collection Of Her Majesty The Queen At Windsor Castle - Volume II - Horses And Other Animals, a three-volume tome prepared with art historian Sir Kenneth Clarke, and published in 1987. He believed Horse and Rider was a model for what was to have been a monumental statue of Leonardo's patron, the French Governor of Milan.

Over the centuries, Leonardo's beeswax model had suffered damage--including the loss of the rider's hands and the left foreleg of the horse. Recognizing the fragile nature of the figure, a mold was created to preserve its integrity, and a single bronze was cast directly from the mold--ensuring Leonardo's Horse and Rider would be memorialized in perpetuity. Most recently, Horse and Rider was exhibited at the Leonardo da Vinci exhibition at the Palazzo delle Stelline in Milan, Italy.

Leonardo da Vinci's Horse and Rider sculpture in bronze, along with the original mold, will be displayed at the Pierre Hotel in New York City for previewing. Prior to the auction additional viewings can be made by appointment. Please contact Guernsey's at 212-794-2280 for more information.

Additional materials:

For a 24-page book written by Leonardo scholar, Ernesto Solari, please click here.

A video outlining the history of the statuette, from its inception to today, can be viewed here.

[nuconvert]

Rough staying in the saddle with no hands & no feet.

[skr]

True, lol!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Swordmaker.

I've been absent a lot of late, been feeling poorly, the dog ate my homework, etc. Here are the other GGG topics introduced since the previous Digest ping:

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[Varda]

My “art review from limited perspectives” has kicked in. I don’t see a horse bucking.
This is a statue of a riding master teaching a horse the Capriole. It’s one of the military moves of the classical riding school, the Lipizzaner’s of Austria made famous in modern times.

Granted I only took dressage for a short time, but I swear that’s exactly what this looks like. The horse is correctly on the bit and not out of control.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Varda!

[SunkenCiv]

I haven’t watched it yet, must switch machines to do that, meanwhile:

Levade and Capriole
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMB0QTDbNjU

[Varda]

Thanks! I watched and it's good. Here's a picture of a trainer working on the Standing Capriole with the trainer on the ground.

[Cvengr]

The wax ones go for $10 ea down in Tijuana.

[SunkenCiv]

http://www.google.com/search?q=davinci+horse+grand+rapids+milan&tbm=isch

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo%2527s_horse

[Varda]

This is the one I know as Leonardo's horse. The details in it (and the wax sculpture) look much better than the sculpture at auction.

[SunkenCiv]

The statue of the horse, to be made in honor of the Sforza dynasty, was of course not made at the time, but Leonardo made a wax model, and had planned to bury it upside down, pouring the molten bronze into the hoofs, casting the whole thing using the lost-wax process. Like so many projects, he left it unfinished, but the bronze had to be used instead to make cannon during the unsuccessful defense of Milan against an attack by, hmm, I think the French, who used the model for target practice.

The two modern versions are based on the drawing, were made (if memory serves) in upstate NY. An 8 foot proof of concept used to stand on the west side of the walkway leading to the Grand Rapids horse, but that was later donated or sold to yet another location. The other full-sized version was sent to Milan. For a brief time, the two completed horses were displayed outside the building where they’d been made, that would have been nice to see.