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Double-body Renaissance cabinet in walnut burl wood, Genoa, late 16th/17th century

h cm 177X123X56
Richly carved with full-round figures placed on the sides. Cap with rosettes interspersed between decorative heads. Central burl chest carved with arched architectural motifs inside chest of drawers with arched door on the sides. Nude figures placed on the sides. Low body with two doors with lion-head handles on the sides within a frame in the center with female busts. Lion feetWe call this piece of furniture a bambocci for the series of full-round carvings of full figures and protomes that decorate both the front and the sides of the entire artifact.
This name has ample documentary evidence from the mid-16th century to the mid-17th century.
The diffusion of this furniture took place in Genoa due to the influence of Spain and Flanders.
The Genoese magister lignaminis initially still created bambocci with Nordic or Turkish faces, with bodies cloaked in large robes and heads with turbans and headdresses. Later in the 16th century, figures with Roman clothing appeared.
The piece of furniture in question presents both of these characteristics, which is why we can chronologically place it at the end of the 16th/17th century, the work of master carvers who were part of the Bancalari Corporation whose foundation dates back to the mid-13th century.
In Genoa, such precious furnishings were typical of the Baroque period and adorned the homes of the nobles with preciousness as was appropriate for the city known as the Superb.
The piece of furniture is in excellent condition with pilasters of bambocci on the sides, both in the low and high body, arched carvings in the calatola with floral inserts, the doors have applied lion heads, and the feet are feline, at the top in the hat appear half-busts of Turkey which are the handles of two drawers. Laterally in the piece of furniture are applied female heads while when the calatola is lowered twelve drawers appear with two small doors on the sides decorated with bambocci. We can consider this work of cabinetmaking an expression of a figurative language specific to Ligurian production.

17/10/2024 16:24:02
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