Description

Joseph de Levis applied his distinctive signature (between 1577 and 1605) to a whole range of fantastic, Mannerist, bronze artifacts, some 45 in all. They range from large church bells-some still in situ-and miniature table bells, to mortars, inkstands, perfume burners, door knockers, firedogs, statuettes, and even a portrait-bust. Joseph's sons and nephews continued the family business into the seventeenth century, signing a similar range of artifacts in an early Baroque style. This book provides a unique cross-section of the production of a hardworking and resilient renaissance foundry. Frequently inscriptions and coats-of-arms specify his wide ranging clientèle, from civic and church authorities, to guilds and confraternities (all-important in society at the time), nobility, merchants, and connoisseur-collectors. Bronzes by the De Levis dynasty are now dispersed among museums in Europe, the USA and Israel, and in Old Master collections. A notable collector being the late Robert H. Smith, whose foundation purchased in 2002 the eye-catching Ewer from the Salomon de Rothschild Foundation in Paris for £276,000. This well illustrated catalogue raisonné is important to both art history and from the perspective of the Jewish Diaspora in Renaissance Italy.