In this previously unpublished half-bust, one can undoubtedly recognize the image of a Philosopher, as suggested by the attitude of the depicted figure - a mature man captured in a thoughtful gaze, lips slightly parted as if about to speak, his rugged face, and the very presence of the mantle covering his head, a recurring and defining element in the iconography of ancient thinkers. A fine example of those « arie di teste » that enjoyed great success in Venice from the second half of the 17th century, following the acclaim of Giusto Le Court’s heads of apostles and philosophers among the most discerning collectors of the time, our bust, by its distinctive formal features, reveals itself as the work of one of the most important sculptors active in the Serenissima Republic at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries: Marino Groppelli. The son of sculptor Giovanni Battista, Marino is documented as active as early as 1682, but his earliest known works are the six marble figures created between 1691 and 1692, commissioned by Abbess Cecilia Correr for the high altar of Santa Croce on the Giudecca: two Angels and four Putti, now divided between the altar of the Crucifix and that of San Giovanni Battista in the parish church of Sant’Antonio Abate in Lussingrande. Shortly afterward, between 1694 and 1695, he was entrusted with a second prestigious commission: he is documented among the artists engaged by Doge Francesco Morosini to execute sculptures for his monument, intended for the Venetian church of Santo Stefano, though it was never completed. - Simone Guerriero.
