Sprite
Ad
TAGS
Download or edit the free picture Sprite for GIMP online editor. It is an image that is valid for other graphic or photo editors in OffiDocs such as Inkscape online and OpenOffice Draw online or LibreOffice online by OffiDocs.
With feathered heels and shoulders, this boy is a singular evocation of the god Mercury. The fleecy tail is a novel addition. The body is piped inside to allow the flow of water, which once splashed against a whirligig, causing the toy to rotate in the upraised hand. The figure is in all likelihood to be identified with the "little spirit" that was gilt in 1432 by a painter named Antonio and later inventoried in the garden of Palazzo Medici as a "bronze idol on a ball." The Medici family adopted Mercury, who included commerce among his realms of authority, as a tutelary genius (their coat of arms also incorporates balls). It is easy to imagine an orb, which could also imply the terrestrial globe, under our boy's cupped foot. In 1515 Gianfrancesco Rustici sculpted a bronze Mercury (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge) in the form of a teenager but otherwise faithfully followed the child's curvilinear pose, and that sculpture replaced ours in the Medici garden. When the Winged Boy appeared at auction with little advance notice, the Trustees responded generously at the chance to acquire a rarity so close in spirit and wealth of texture to the work of the great Donatello.Free picture Sprite integrated with the OffiDocs web apps
