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Statuette of Cupid holding a mirror, H2055

Explanation

  • The statuette represents the god of love, Cupid, standing erect on a pedestal. In his right hand he is holding out a folding mirror to an unknown beholder. Is it perhaps none other than Venus, busy making herself look beautiful? The small bronze Cupid might have constituted part of the decoration on a toilet case with a theme taken from Venus’s universe. In view of her role as goddess of beauty, it would have been a suitable motif for an art antique beauty box. In ancient times, Cupid was a popular motif for decorating jug handles, vessels, oil lamps, signet rings and all kinds of domestic utensils. In Thorvaldsen’s day there was a corresponding fascination with the god of love, who appeared frequently as a motif in Thorvaldsen’s own works. Cupid with a mirror is one of the many Roman bronze statuettes in the collection of antiquities that can be dated to the 1st or 2nd centuries A.D.