CIRCLE OF PIERRE-ÉTIENNE MONNOT | SAINT PAUL

Pierre-Étienne Monnot (1657-1733) had his early training in France, before moving to Rome in around 1687. He was also among the select group of sculptors commissioned to carve apostles of heroic scale for Borromini's niches in the Basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano. Monnot's monumental figure of St. Paul, for which no bozzetto is known, was completed in 1711.

The sculptor of the present statuette had an intimate knowledge of Monnot's Saint Paul, in the position of this figure's limbs and the particular folds in the drapery. Furthermore, the author was familiar with the work of other important sculptor's in Rome, including that of Alessandro Algardi, whose specific facial types clearly informed the fine head and beard of the present figure.

RELATED LITERATURE

Robert Enggass, Early Eighteenth-Century Sculpture in Rome - an illustrated catalogue raisonné, University Park and London, 1976