Jewelry casket

Pietro Giusti

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Pietro Giusti, one of the most successful nineteenth-century designers and sculptors in Tuscany, was known for his elaborately carved frames and furniture in sixteenth-century styles. Here, Giusti may have been inspired by the work of the Renaissance artist Antonio Barili (1453–1516); Guisti was probably familiar with Barili’s cassone surmounted by the she-wolf with Romulus and Remus and with fabled monsters at the four corners in the Museo Civico, Siena. The city is traditionally thought to have been founded by the Romans, hence the use of the she-wolf on its seal and many of its civic buildings.

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