皇冠体育app

This will provide a last chance to raise the money to keep the sculpture in the United Kingdom.听

皇冠体育app Minister鈥檚 ruling follows a recommendation by the , administered by . 皇冠体育app Committee recommended that the export decision be deferred on the grounds that the sculpture is of outstanding significance for the study of English sculpture in the 18th Century.

皇冠体育app white marble sculpture dates from 1702 and depicts the nude goddess Venus with her arms crossed, head turned to the right and half kneeling on a rectangular base. 皇冠体育app figure is based on an antique prototype known as the Crouching Venus and may have been modelled on an antique work in the Royal Collection.听 It is a rare surviving example of a classical subject in marble carved by the Netherlandish sculptor John Nost the Elder (d. 1710) working in England.

Lord Inglewood, Chairman of the Reviewing Committee, said: 鈥淭his impressive and compelling figure of the goddess Venus is an important example of one of the earliest versions in England of an antiquity in marble, made for a British client.鈥�

皇冠体育app decision on the export licence application for the sculpture will be deferred for a period ending on 3 January 2012 inclusive. This period may be extended until 3 May 2012 inclusive if a serious intention to raise funds with a view to making an offer to purchase the sculpture at the recommended price of 拢485,000 (plus VAT, amount to be confirmed, which can be reclaimed by most public institutions).

Anyone interested in making an offer to purchase the sculpture should contact the owner鈥檚 agent through:
听
皇冠体育app Secretary
皇冠体育app Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest
Arts Council England
14 Great Peter Street
London
SW1P 3NQ

Tel: 020 7973 5259

Anyone interested in making a matching offer who requires further information from the Champion about听 the sculpture should contact 皇冠体育app Secretary to the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest at the above address.

Notes to Editors

1. For all media enquiries please Emma Russell, Media Relations Officer, Arts Council England听 on 020 7973 6890, email: [email protected].

2. For enquiries on the operation of and casework arising from the work of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) please contact Peter Rowlands, RCEWA Secretary, on 020 7973 5259, email [email protected].

3. 皇冠体育app Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest is an independent body, serviced by Arts Council England, which advises the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on whether a cultural object, intended for export, is of national importance under specified criteria. Where the Committee finds that an object meets one or more of the criteria, it will normally recommend that the decision on the export licence application should be deferred for a specified period. An offer may then be made from within the United Kingdom at or above the recommended fair market price.

4. 皇冠体育app details of the object are:

   • John Nost the Elder (active 1680s- d. 1710)
   • 皇冠体育app Crouching Venus (1702)
   • signed and dated: I. Nost .. F/1702
   • marble
   • total height:听听 237 cm
   • statue height: 听122 cm
   • plinth height:听 听115cm

PROVENANCE
Probably commissioned by Andrew Archer for Umberslade Hall in 1702
First positively documented at Umberslade Hall in 1815 Umberslade Hall was acquired by the Muntz family in 1856.
Acquired by Thomas Coulborn & Sons from Robert Muntz Esq. in October 2007

皇冠体育app earliest existing documentation for the statue being at Umberslade Hall dates to 1815, when the Hall was described as 鈥渓ong-neglected鈥�, and indeed had not been regularly occupied since 1778 so it is logical to suppose that the Venus must have been there some time before the death of the 2nd Lord Archer in 1778. While some internal decoration did take place in the time of Andrew Archer鈥檚 son Thomas (1st Lord Archer), who inherited in 1741, it is much more likely that the statue was commissioned by his father Andrew in 1702 as the house was constructed c. 1693-98.

LITERATURE
I. Roscoe, A Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors in Britain 1660-1851, New Haven, 2009
Tyack, Geoffrey, Warwickshire Country Houses, Phillimore & Co., 1994, page 190

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