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Title:
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Gioacchino Rossini
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Artist: |
Baron Carlo Marochetti
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This statue of the composer Rossini was presented to the city of Pesaro by two very wealthy financiers, Jose de Salamanca and Gustave Delahante, both of whom were much involved with railway building. It shows the composer in old age, seated in a wooden armchair, with an elaborate ornamental back, holding a piece of paper in his right hand, while his left rests on the arm of the chair. It is an extremely deadpan image, possibly based on a carte de visite photo of Rossini. It was inaugurated, during Rossini's own lifetime, in Pesaro on 21 August 1864, and then stood outside the town's railway station. It was still there in February 1892, when the monthly supplement of the Milan journal Il Secolo complained, "The position chosen for the statue is certainly not the best, or the most suitable, because the whistling of the locomotives and the discordant clamour of the nearby station, are an unfortunate accompaniment to the genius, and to the ideal character of the man who was the creator or of so many sublime melodies." The composer outlived Marochetti himself by almost one year. The statue was later moved to the courtyard of the Palazzo Olivieri Machirelli, now the seat of the Pesaro's Conservatorion Rossini. Interestingly the inscription on the granite pedestal of the statue states not only that it was Marochetti's work, but also that he cast it. He had been operating his own foundry since the early 1850s, but it was unusual for such a claim to be made in an inscription. Usually a founder's mark would be found on the self-base of a statue, along with the artist's signature. The plaster model for this statue is in the reserve collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, one of a considerable number of items presented to what was then the South Kensington Museum
by the sculptor's widow, following his death. The model of the Rossini statue is now one of only two items remaining from this donation.
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Material(s): |
Bronze
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Medium: |
Unassigned |
Finish: |
- |
Technique: |
Cast |
Genre: |
Unassigned
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Location: |
Conservatorio di Musica Rossini, Pesaro, , ,
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Colours: |
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Year: |
1864 |
Height: |
1.61 metres |
Width: |
0 metres |
Depth: |
0 metres |
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Key: |
5760 |
Acc. No.: |
5760 |
Col. No.: |
5760 |
Number of views: |
2346 |
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