Beschreibung:

Paoletti (Bartolome, 1757-1834, & Pietro, 1801-1847). A collection of 52 plaster cameos (or intaglios), presented in a leather-bound double-sided faux book box, Rome, circa 1820, 52 white plaster intaglios, or impronte (miniature impressions in relief of ancient gems, cameos, coins and medals, as well as modern sculptures and portraits), each bordered with pale yellow paper (with manuscript numbers added in ink), and edged in gilt, generally between 2 and 5 cm in diameter, (but some between 6 and 9 cm), carefully arranged and mounted in recessed double-sided book-boxes, lined with dark blue paper, manuscript list of contents in brown ink to front and rear pastedowns of each volume, giving the subject, artist or location, with the address of the manufacturer added at foot of front pastedown 'Si fanno in Roma da Bartomomeo Paoletti, e Pietro Figlio, dimoranti di Studio in Piazza di Spagna numo. 49', marbled paper outer edges, original brown half calf over marbled paper boards, spines gilt, and lettered PAOLETTI, 3 and 'Uomini Illustri, Villa Albani, Museo di Firenze', rubbed and scuffed with a little wear to extremities, 8vo (24.5 x 15.5 cm) A collection of early 19th century plaster intaglios, known in Italian as 'impronte', manufactured by the Paoletti family, which became highly popular amongst aristocratic and fashionable travellers on the Grand Tour during the early part of the 19th century, especially from England. The Paolettis numbered amongst their clients Catherine the Great of Russia, Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Lord Elgin, and are listed in Heinrich Keller's contemporary directory of artists and craftsmen working in Rome in 1824 (Elenco di tutti i pittori, scultori, architetti miniatori...di Roma) at the same address as given in the present examples (page 70). Designed to form a kind of miniature museum of the history of art and classical mythology, this collection covers the collections of three museums in Rome: Uomini Illustri nel Museo Capitolino, Villa Albani, and the Museo de Firenze. Individual subjects include: Dante, Ariosto, Tasso, Petrarch, Correggio, Michelangelo, Galileo, Leonardo, Palladio, Titian, Poussin, Angelica Kauffmann Winkelman; from the Villa Albani: Bacchante, Antinous, Agrippina, Aesop and Cupid; and from the Museo di Firenze: Venus, Minerva, Three Graces, Medici Venus, Raphael's Madonna della Sedia, Titian's Venus, Hercules defeating the Centaur, Mercury by Giambologna, Machiavelli, Niobe, and her four daughters.