UK blocks export of £4.6m Renaissance bronze to find buyer
A 20-centimetre bronze nymph valued at £4.6 million has to stay in Britain while museums try to buy it.
The UK government has temporarily blocked the export of Seated Nymph, a Renaissance sculpture by the Italian sculptor Pier Jacopo Alari Bonacolsi, known as Antico, The Art Newspaper reported.
Antico made the work in around 1503. It stands 20 centimetres high and is cast in bronze, with mercury gilding — gold bonded to the metal — on the hair and drapery, and eyes inlaid with silver.
The sculpture has a long British history. It was previously in the collection of the Dukes of Bedford and sold at Sotheby's in London in 2009 for £1.4 million with fees. Another version of the same figure is held in the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.
The government is now asking galleries and institutions across the UK to step in and keep it in the country. It published an announcement titled "UK galleries urged to save rare Renaissance masterpiece" about the sculpture on 18 September, according to the UK Government.
An export bar is a temporary block on taking a cultural object abroad. It gives a British buyer time to match the price. The decision follows advice from the Reviewing Committee, the body that advises the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in London on whether an object intended for export counts as a national treasure.
The clock is tight. The bar on Seated Nymph will initially expire on 17 December, after which the owners will have 15 business days to consider any offers. If a serious bid emerges, a second deferral period of five months can follow to allow a purchase to be completed.
What makes this one worth watching is the paper trail. Turn the figure over, in effect, and the labels run from an English ducal collection to a London saleroom and now to a nationwide appeal. For visitors, the outcome decides whether this small, glittering nymph stays where the public can see it.
