Head of a young man – Marble Italy 16th century

This charming marble head represents a young man with a fine face, fleshy lips and wavy hair. Slightly leaning forward, this head is now mounted on a cylindrical base also in marble. We can assume that this piece was originally a complete body and that the head was separated, as evidenced by the neck break. We can also assume, from the tilt of the head, that the original body had a certain contrapposto: traditional posture in the representation of the human body in the Renaissance.
This soft and elegant face is reminiscent of the ancient representations of the handsome young man: the beautiful ephebe. A true ideal of masculine beauty among the ancients, the beautiful ephebe is a model of physical perfection. Alexander the Great will also give his features to the representations of the young ephebe at the beginning of his reign. This model of representation of the handsome young man in the face of Alexander will be repeated throughout the Mediterranean basin during Antiquity, and with its rediscovery at the beginning of the Renaissance, the model will again be taken up to spread in Europe.
Our piece is therefore an excellent example of a modern creation called «all’Antica »: a model dating from Antiquity taken back to the Renaissance.