Head of Dionysus

Luigi Valadier

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Formerly considered an adaptation from the first half of XIX century of a classical bronze sculpture in the Museo Nazionale, Naples). Now believed to have been inspired by an antique term such as those incorporated by Piranesi into his design for the marble chimneypiece that was executed for the 9th Earl of Exeter, Burghley house, Northamptonshire. The bust was probably executed by the same Italian workshop that produced the Burghley House chimneypiece in the years before 1769.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art