Getty Museum

Infant

Girolamo Campagna

Date: about 1605–1607
Medium: Bronze
Culture: Italian
Department: Sculpture
Institution: Getty Museum

The nude chubby boy standing on a convex base, the crowning figure of an altar complex in the church of San Giacomo di Rialto in Venice, was probably intended to represent the Christ child. In his left hand the child once held an attribute that might have revealed his identity. Considering his open gesture, which closely resembles the pose of Christ blessing, the missing object may have been a cross, a globe, or a crown. The sculpture was cast in one piece using the lost wax process. As in his other works, the sculptor Girolamo Campagna conveyed a sense of movement through the organization of the figure's body. The boy's torso twists gently while his arms and legs move in opposite directions, suggesting motion rather than a static pose. In contrast to the body's sensuous modeling, especially at the hips, thighs and ankles, the boy's face is defined by the smooth planes of his high forehead and heavy-lidded eyes.

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Creator

Girolamo Campagna

Italian Artist · 1549–1550

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Girolamo Campagna dominated sculptural production in Venice in the last decades of the sixteenth century. He won the most important commissions of his day and supervised a large workshop of masters, apprentices, and pupils. Born to a furrier in Verona in 1549, he moved to Venice in 1572 to study with the sculptor Danese Cattaneo. After the death of his teacher, he took on Cattaneo's unfinished com