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What item was stolen from the museum in Vienna?
Climbing scaffolding and smashing a window early Sunday, thieves slipped into Vienna’s Art History Museum and — despite high-tech motion sensors and round-the-clock guards — disappeared with a 16th century gold masterpiece sculpted by Benvenuto Cellini.
Where is the Cellini salt cellar?
Vienna
The Cellini Salt Cellar (in Vienna called the Saliera, Italian for salt cellar) is a part-enamelled gold table sculpture by Benvenuto Cellini. It was completed in 1543 for Francis I of France, from models that had been prepared many years earlier for Cardinal Ippolito d’Este.
What is the symbolism of Cellini’s salt cellar for Francis I?
The Cellini Salt Cellar depicts a male figure representing the sea and a female figure that represents the earth. A small vessel meant to hold salt is placed next to the male figure. It was modelled and cast by the Italian sculptor and goldsmith Benvenuto Cellini for Francis I of France sometime between 1539 and 1543.
Why was Cellini banished Florence?
Cellini, resisting the efforts of his father to train him as a musician, was apprenticed as a metalworker in the studio of the Florentine goldsmith Andrea di Sandro Marcone. Banished to Siena as a result of a brawl in 1516, he returned to Florence during 1517–19 and then moved to Rome.
Where is Benvenuto Cellini buried?
1562 CE), which was perhaps originally intended for the sculptor’s own tomb but which now resides in the San Lorenzo Monastery, El Escorial, Spain. Cellini died in May 1571 CE, and he was buried in the Basilica of the Most Holy Annunciation in Florence.
What figures decorate the base of Cellini’s salt cellar for St Francis I and what are they based on?
The base is decorated with four figures in reclining poses, which, according to Cellini, can be identified as Night, Day, Twilight and Dawn, and draw on Michelangelo’s statues of the same personifications for the Medici Tomb at the Sacristy of San Lorenzo in Florence.
Can stolen art be sold?
Stolen art can be a hard sell. We spoke to the experts about what thieves tend do with it. An empty frame at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Photo by Ryan McBride/AFP via Getty Images.
What is the punishment for art theft?
shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.
Who were Cellini’s enemies in Florence?
The Escorial Crucifix (1556) exemplifies the superiority of Cellini’s art to the works of his rivals Bartolommeo Ammannati and Baccio Bandinelli.
How big is Cellini’s salt cellar?
Benvenuto Cellini, Salt cellar, 1540-43, gold, enamel, ebony, and ivory, 28.5 x 21.5 x 26.3 cm (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) In his autobiography, Cellini included an extensive description of the salt cellar that helps to shed light on its iconography and meanings.
What happened to Benvenuto Cellini’s art?
When a thief broke into the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna in 2003, one object in particular caught his attention. The gallery lights glinted off an intricately worked gold and enamel surface—this was the famous salt cellar by the sixteenth-century Florentine sculptor and goldsmith, Benvenuto Cellini.
What is the salt cellar made of?
The salt cellar is made of ivory, rolled gold, and vitreous enamel. The gold is not cast in a mould but hammered by hand into its delicate shape. It stands about 26 cm tall.
How is the sea represented in the salt cellar?
In Cellini’s description, the sea was represented by a male figure reclining beside a ship for holding the salt; the earth he “fashioned like a woman” and placed a temple near her to serve as a receptacle for pepper. The salt cellar is made of ivory, rolled gold, and vitreous enamel.