Harvard Art Museums

Charity Treading on Avarice

Giuseppe Mazzuoli

Date

c. 1715

Medium

Bronze

Culture

Italian

Department

Department of Paintings, Sculpture & Decorative Arts

Institution

Harvard Art Museums

Giuseppe Mazzuoli's allegorical figure of Charity is personified as a mother with three children. As the greatest of all theological virtues, Charity triumphs over the vice of Avarice, represented as a greedy man biting his left hand and clutching a bag of coins with the other. This sculptural group recalls the influence of Gian Lorenzo Bernini, who Mazzuoli often assisted with large public commissions. Among these was the tomb for Pope Alexander VII (1672-78) in Saint Peter's Basilica, for which Mazzuoli sculpted a more than life-sized figure of Charity in marble. This earlier work is recalled here in Mazzuoli's voluptuous bronze figure. The dynamic drapery, multifigured composition, and spiraling movement of the group also point to Mazzuoli's indebtedness to Bernini.

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