315. Lorenzo Bartolini (Italian, 1777-1850), “Portrait Bust of Don Camillo Borghese (1775-1832), Prince of Sulmona and Duke of Guastalla”, c. 1804-09, white marble, uninscribed, height 22 in. $12000/18000 Provenance: Joseph Napoleon Bonaparte (17681844), King of Naples 1806-8 and King of Spain 18081813; his sale, Point Breeze, Bordentown, NJ (by Anthony J. Bleeker of New York), 25 June 1847, lot 23 (p. 3 of the catalogue); probably Julia Ward Howe or a member of her family (her sister Annie Howe married Adolphe Maillard, son of Joseph Bonaparte’s secretary Louis Maillard); Fanny Gay Howe (widow of Julia Ward Howe’s son); purchased from her estate sale 1929 by J. Prescott Hall; donated by him to a mid-Atlantic museum, 1932; deaccessioned from that institution, c. 2008. Note: This superb bust is catalogued in Anthony Bleeker’s pamphlet for the sale at Point Breeze as “[No.] 23—Marble Bust of Prince Borghese, husband of Princess Pauline, sister to Napoleon, by Bartolini.” Paolina Bonaparte-Borghese is of course the subject of the most celebrated sculpture of the Neo-Classic movement, her life-size recumbent portrait (1804-8) as Venus Victorious by Antonio Canova (1757-1822), still exhibited in its original dedicated room at the Villa Borghese in Rome. She and Camillo Borghese were married on 6 November 1803 at Mortefontaine, Joseph Bonaparte’s château near Paris; Camillo became in quick succession a prince of France, 1804; a commander of the Imperial Guard, 1805; a general, then duke of Guastalla; governor of Piedmont, 1808; and a division commander in the Imperial Army, 1809. The specific group of marble busts by Bartolini in King Joseph Bonaparte’s collection—no. 20, Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland 1806-10; no. 21, Jérôme
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Bonaparte, King of Westphalia 1807-13; no. 22, Félix Bacciochi (husband of Elisa Bonaparte, Grand Duchess of Tuscany 1809-14), Prince of Piombino and Lucca 1805-14; and no. 23, Prince Borghese—were all of men, and were clearly a coherent series, from which even Napoleon’s own sisters were excluded. From the dates of their and their consort’s 315 promotions, and of his own appointment in 1807 as professor at Carrara, Bartolini’s date of execution of these four male busts for Joseph Bonaparte must have been c. 1807/9, or immediately following Canova’s sublime rendering of Paolina Borghese in Rome. A native of Tuscany, Lorenzo Bartolini was trained at Florence, Carrara, and Volterra (1795) before joining the French army in 1799, and traveling to Paris to study with Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825); there he won the prestigious Prix de Rome in 1802. His many Napoleonic commissions soon followed, and culminated in his appointment under Princess Elisa Bonaparte-Bacciochi (as already Regent of Etruria) in 1807 at the Accademia di Carrara, which she reorganized as a center for the production of Imperial family statues and busts. This very spirited image of Camillo Borghese in his early thirties epitomizes the degree to which Bartolini was the true parallel and successor of Canova. The dramatic shock of hair over his forehead, and his characteristic whiskers, are also repeated in Borghese’s painted portraits (it is no accident that Bartolini’s closest artistic friend was J.-A.-D. Ingres, 1780-1867), and effectively frame the powerful yet amiable features that made this sitter a particular favorite of le Grand Empereur. References: Anthony J. Bleeker (New York), Catalogue of … Elegant Sculpture … Belonging to the Estate of the late Joseph Napoleon Bonaparte, 25 June 1847, lot 23; “Bonaparte,” Grove Dictionary of Art, Jane Turner, ed., 34 vols., London, 1996, vol. 4, pp. 298-308; Ettore Spalletti, “Bartolini,” ibid., vol. 3, pp. 294297; and Brunk Auctions (Asheville, NC), 9-10 May 2009, lot 956, for details of intermediate provenance.