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Catalogue >Fine Art >  General >  Art of the Renaissance Bronze 1500-1650- The Robert H. Smith Collection Art of the Renaissance Bronze 1500-1650- The Robert H. Smith Collection Anthony Radcliffe and Nicholas Penny An important new publication detailing bronzes of the 16th and 17th centuries drawn from the Robert H. Smith Collection. The sculptures include major works from Northern Italy, Rome, and Northern Europe.The fruits of sixteen years of discriminating acquisition on the international art market, Robert Smith's is one of the most important collections of European bronzes in private hands today. The collection embraces the Renaissance in Italy and northern Europe in such a way that its components complement and enhance the appreciation of each other. 'far reaching and comprehensive' Antiques Magazine June 2005 'Perhaps the highpoint for catalogues of private collections of paintings and works of art was reached in the decades around the turn of the twentieth century - although a very different sort of book, this new catalogue sits firmly within that tradition.' 'The catalogue is an excellent piece of work.' Burlington Magazine, December 2005 320 pages / 274 x 214 mm / 134 colour illustrations / hardback / ISBN 0 85667 590 3 EAN 9780856675904 | Retail price £25.00   Online price: £17.50 / €26.25 In no other art form are the ideals of the Renaissance better exemplified than in small bronze sculpture. This book serves at once as a catalogue of one of the finest private collections of such bronzes ever formed and as an introduction to the artists who made such sculptures, the subjects they represent, the purposes some of the works originally served and the settings for which some of them were made. A separate essay provides a lucid account of the ways in which the sculptures were modelled, cast, assembled, tooled and coloured.Works discussed in detail include several bells and a mortar, a pair of lamps and a miniature cannon as well as statuettes which may once have adorned andirons or ornamental cabinets, also bronzes which reproduce the small models made for monumental sculpture in marble and bronze. But over half of the sculptures - and the most exquisite pieces in the collection - were designed to be turned in the hands of the connoisseur. The bronzes in this collection range in date from between the close of the fifteenth century and the middle of the seventeenth and include masterpieces by Antico, Bandinelli, Vittoria, Tiziano Aspetti, and Roccatagliata, as well as an especially strong group of works associated with Giambologna and from the Florentine foundries of the Susini and Tacca families. The book incorporates the entries in the much acclaimed catalogue of the collection published in 1992; not only are there many more entries but also additional essays which transform the nature of the publication. Anthony Radcliffe was Keeper of Sculpture at the Victoria and Albert Museum 1979-89 and is now Keeper Emeritus; Nicholas Penny is Senior Curator of Sculpture and Decorative Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.