* Donatello [after] Boy’s Head {by 1894} Loc? [SC]

Donatello (c.1386-1466; Italian), after
Boy’s Head
Bronze (?)
Presented by the Education Department, by 1894; sold at auction, 1943
Unidentified; present location unknown

The 1894 NGV catalogue lists a “Boy’s Head” after Donatello as donated by the Melbourne Education Department, including it under casts. Unless it was a plaster cast (another possibility), it may be the bronze boy’s head described as by Lorenzetti of Florence and sold for £21 in the 1943 auction of NGV sculpture.

However, without a photograph or further information, it is impossible to identify this work or its likely source, presumably one of several busts of youths circulating in the 19^th century as supposedly by Donatello.

[comparative photo: 19th-century bronze said to be after Donatello (auctioned in England 2015)]

Refs.

NGV 1894, p.148 (VIII.Cast Gallery [Antique Room], no.71)

For the example reproduced here, see https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/nick-mellors/catalogue-id-srnich10007/lot-d0e0ba0a-bdd8-43bf-90b8-a4c0009d6895 (accessed 15 March 2020)