Attributed to Taddeo Carlone, a male bust, 1575, marble Taddeo Carlone (attr.) (Rovio 1543 - Genoa 1615) VIRILE BUST 1575 marble sculpture, 58x56x28 cm The bust, portraying a character unknown at the time, surprising in its synthetic and geometric abstraction of volumes, can be attributed to Taddeo Carlone. A sculptor of Ticino origin and son of art - his father Giovanni was also a prolific and gifted sculptor -, Taddeo was the undisputed protagonist of marble sculpture in Genoa in the second half of the 16th century, as demonstrated by the many works he created for the Doria family, including the grandiose Neptune Fountain at the Villa del Principe (1599-1601). It is possible to find convincing comparisons with the early numbers in Taddeo Carlone's catalogue and in particular with two of the famous Doria sepulchres in Santa Maria della Cella in Sampierdarena, the Doria family church and family pantheon (G. Bozzo, Taddeo Carlone scultore a Genova, 1543-1615. Un brand , Genoa 2023, pp. 27-31 cat. V; G. Langosco, Taddeo Carlone e i monumenti Doria della chiesa della Cella: un'impresa dinastica , in Nelle terre del marmo. Maestri e geografia nella scultura del Cinquecento , edited by A. Bartelletti, G. Donati, A. Galli, Pisa 2023, pp. 265-289). In fact, the busts of Giovan Battista Doria (1576-1577) and Ceva Doria (1578-1581) show an identical physiognomic connotation with the bone structure clearly in view, the severe and as if chilled expressiveness, beard and hair compact and conducted with very fine incisions, drawn irises and pupils; The bust also shares eloquent similarities with the two Dorian portraits in the way the gorget is made and the scampish course of the neck immediately below it. An important element in support of the bust's Ligurian origin also comes from its Piedmontese provenance, an area that from a historical point of view has always felt the influence of Genoese art, especially in the modern age and particularly in the field of marble sculpture. The bust was in fact preserved in the Fornaca-Lobetti Bodoni villa in Vische, in the province of Turin. The building was built, in neo-sixteenth-century style, starting in 1851 by Count Cesare Renato Birago; after various changes of ownership, around 1930 the villa passed to Guido Fornaca, managing director of Fiat in the so-called 'golden years of the Lingotto' (T. Bussetti, Un maestoso edificio. La storica villa di Vische , in "Canavèis", 24, 2014, pp. 19-22).