Edited and adapted from Christie's' lot essay, October 2020:
This composition was originally intended as the study for a head of Danaid commissioned by Emperor Nicholas I of Russia. Rauch took great care in the model’s creation, choosing Luise Engel, a young woman famed for her beauty, for his subject. Dissatisfied, however, with his inability to capture the longing expression necessary for a Danaid, he transformed the study into a Flora, adding the elaborate wreath adorned with a double band of flowers. In 1839, Rauch noted in a letter that he sent a version of the Flora composition as a forerunner to the Danaid to Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, who was so pleased with the piece that she thanked him with a diamond ring decorated with her cipher. Rauch charmingly declared the bust to be a "fallen chip" from his larger Danaid composition for the Emperor, which was finished in the same year to great acclaim. In her catalogue raisonné on the artist, von Simson discusses three marble busts of Flora, the first one gifted to the Empress, the second, a significantly damaged version, in a private Berlin collection in the late 1990s, and a third recorded in the account book. It is possible that this piece is the latter, however, given the provenance of the present bust, it is more probable that this work is that which was gifted to the Empress in the 1830s. Further strengthening the Imperial Russian provenance, is that this bust formed part of the auctioned collection of the painter Paraskewe von Bereskine. Included in this sale were multiple lots of Russian origin and documented pieces from the Imperial Russian collections, formerly in the Palace of Pavlovsk and the Catherine Palace at Tsarskoe Selo.
Rauch’s sculptures still shape the landscape of many German cities today. He was particularly sought after for his public monuments and he found favor among many royal and aristocratic collectors, including the Prussian ruling family and the royal houses of Bavaria and Hanover. Interest in Rauch and the "Berlin School" as not only limited to the Continent. Rauch was collected by members of the British aristocracy including the sixth Duke of Devonshire and the Duke of Wellington, who visited Rauch’s studio in 1826 and subsequently commissioned several works. He was also featured in London’s Great Exhibition of 1851. While Rauch may have become famous for his public monuments and well-publicized royal commissions, his reputation has been revived by sculptures such as the present bust. It is technically brilliant but, most of all, it’s modern appeal is that it is refreshingly intimate and intensely personal.
Auction estimate: USD 30,000 - USD 50,000
Price realised: USD 200,000
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