This video is called Introducing Rinaldo Rinaldi Statue at Morton Auctioneers & Appraisers.
From The Scotsman:
Rare statue rescued from the deep is a £45,000 catch for fishermen
CRAIG BROWN (crbrown@scotsman.com)
THREE divers landed the catch of a lifetime when they discovered a 19th century Italian sculpture worth thousands of pounds buried in the silt beneath Scottish waters.
Experts have identified the marble piece found in the Firth of Clyde as a bust of a woman by Rinaldo Rinaldi, a renowned 19th century artist.
Skipper Hector Stewart and his colleagues James Turner and Sean D’Arcy had been diving for shellfish in the freezing cold waters of the firth on January 23 when one of them noticed what he described as an “odd-shaped stone” jutting out of the sea bed.
“We were diving for otter shells, considered a delicacy in the Far East, when James saw what he thought was an odd-shaped stone,” he explained.
“We didn’t think much of it until I spotted what looked like a necklace”.
Once they had cleared the sand from around the sculpture, the men loaded it into a fish box and tied an air bag to it to get it to the surface.
“It took all three of us to get it into the boat” said Mr Stuart who estimated it weighed around 13 stone. The work bears the maker’s name with the words “Roma 1869” on the back.
Similar pieces by Rinaldi – whose work is displayed in the Louvre – have fetched large sums at auction in the past. One piece went for £23,000 ten years ago.
Sotheby‘s have already said that the sculpture, which has been preserved perfectly in the sand, could be worth up to £45,000.
Rinaldo Rinaldi should not be confused with Rinaldo Rinaldini, a fictional Corsican/Italian robber and the title character of a 1798 book, a twentieth century film, etc.
As Rinaldi’s teacher in sculpture, Antonio Canova, should also not be confused with Casanova …
There are also, in twentieth century film history, at least one designer, and (different one again) actor, called Rinaldo Rinaldi.
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Dear Kitty. Some blog 
2007-07-25 12:19
Cupid back for Canova celebrations
Statue at show marking 250th anniversary of artist’s birth
(ANSA) – Rome, July 25 – Antonio Canova’s celebrated portrayal of a teenage Polish prince as Cupid is returning to Italy after over two centuries to take part in the celebrations for the 250th anniversary of the artist’s birth.
The marble masterpiece is the star of an exhibition opening on July 27 in the small northern town of Possagno near Treviso, where the great sculptor was born and is buried. As soon as Canova completed the statue in 1790 it came to be considered an icon of neoclassical beauty.
He was inundated with requests for plaster-cast copies from many of Europe’s most important noble families as a result.
The life-sized work immortalizes Prince Henryk Lubomirsky as the mythological god of love.
Canova started it in 1788. Progress was slow, in part because the young prince was shy about posing nude.
In the end, Canova used the teenager to render Cupid’s head, especially his voluptuous lips, and based the body on ancient statues and other models. The wavy-haired Cupid stares into the distance with his left hand resting on his bow. The work features Canova’s characteristic delicate rendering of the naked body.
On completion, the statue was whisked away to the Lubomirsky family home in Poland, Lancut Castle, where it has been housed ever since. Canova’s (1757-1822) art is held up by experts as the embodiment of the neoclassical notion of refined beauty, which contrasted with the theatrical excesses of the Baroque period before it. The artist left his native Veneto as a young man and spent much of his life in Rome. But the people of Veneto still claimed him as their own and by the time he was 38 he was receiving a stipend from the Venetian Republic. Canova worked for popes, kings, bankers and Russian counts. And he worked for Napoleon Bonaparte, whom he portrayed in various guises so flatteringly that in 1797 the emperor placed the artist under his protection.
The Lubomirsky sculpture will be on show at Canova’s home in Possagno (Casa del Canova).
Visitors will be able to see the rest of the exhibition at the town’s Gipsoteca Canoviana Museum.
This part of the show is made up of 29 works devoted to love and beauty. They include a striking terracotta sculpture of Venus and Adonis, which Canova created in 1787, and a tender plaster depiction of Cupid and Psyche (1800). Tickets to the show, which will run until November 1, will cost seven euros.
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Landmark Canova show opens in Rome
Villa Borghese gallery gathers sculptor’s masterpieces
(ANSA) – Rome, October 18 – Rome’s Villa Borghese Gallery is hosting a landmark show on the great neoclassical sculptor Antonio Canova, gathering 16 of his best-known works from the world’s leading museums. The blockbuster exhibit revolves around Canova’s most iconic work – the statue of Pauline Bonaparte – commissioned by her husband Prince Camillo Borghese in 1805.
The sculpture, considered a defining moment in the concept of neoclassical beauty, has never left the Gallery since it was installed there in 1808.
The marble statue shows Napoleon’s sister as Venus Victrix, the winner in the judgement of Paris, the shepherd-prince asked to choose between the goddesses Juno (power), Minerva (intelligence) and Venus (love).
It was said that Borghese – who sold part of his family’s famous collection of antiquities to Napoleon – was more jealous of Canova’s work than he was of his philandering wife. Canova returned the compliment by defining the Borghese estate as “the most beautiful villa in the world”, and curators said it was fitting that the Gallery has been chosen as the venue for Rome’s first show on the artist.
The exhibit celebrates the 250th anniversary of the sculptor’s birth and the 200th anniversary of the Venus Victrix, a symbol for the Borghese Gallery’s legendary art collection. Curators Anna Coliva and Fernando Mazzocca said the show offers art critics an opportunity to investigate the complex links between Canova, Borghese and the Bonaparte family and the artist’s decision to portray Paolina as a semi-nude goddess, in a major break with canonical portraiture of high-ranking personalities.
Canova (1757-1822) worked for popes, kings, bankers and Russian counts. But he was especially busy for Napoleon Bonaparte, whom he portrayed in various guises so flatteringly that in 1797 Napoleon placed the artist under his wing.
The sculptor was particularly fascinated by the figure of Venus – which is also represented by loans from the Leeds City Art Gallery and the Florence’s Galleria Palatina – but his entire oeuvre features an array of Greek mythological figures.
EXCEPTIONAL LOANS FROM WORLD’S LEADING MUSEUMS.
Among the exceptional loans for the Borghese exhibit are the Three Graces from St. Petersburg’s Hermitage, the Sleeping Nymph from London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, the Naiads from New York’s Metropolitan Museum and Cupid and Psyche from the Louvre.
The show gathers all of Canova’s amorini – the chubby cherub god of love – most of which were produced in the 1790s and includes the Hermitage’s Yusupov Cupid, the only sculpture where he represented the god with wings.
Other masterpieces from the Rome gallery – Bernini’s sculptures of Apollo and Daphne and Pluto and Proserpine and Titian’s Sacred and Profane Love have been strategically placed to flank Canova’s interpretation of the same themes.
At least 50 masterpieces are on show along with a number of drawings, preparatory sketches, and terracotta and clay models in a bid to give visitors an insight into Canova’s creative process. The exhibit runs through February 3.
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Canova’s sculptures in Forli’ show
Event explores his impact on neoclassical art
(ANSA) – Rome, January 2 – The ties between renowned Italian sculptor Antonio Canova and international neoclassical art are the focus of an upcoming exhibition in the western Italian city of Forli’. Canova (1757-1822) was born in the Veneto region and spent most of his adult life in Rome but his impact on neoclassical art was widespread.
The exhibition takes three key sculptures linked to Forli’ as a springboard for exploring Canova’s influence on other painters and sculptors through 160 artworks. A sculpture of Hebe, goddess of youth and daughter of Hera, is the first of the three works. Commissioned by the Countess Veronica Guarini, the statue was completed between 1816 and 1817 and is today one of Canova’s best known works. For many art historians, it epitomizes his skill at transferring the sense of movement common in painting into sculpture. The marble statue shows Hebe as cupbearer of the gods balancing a goblet with ambrosia but the skill of the piece lies in the flapping folds of her dress, as she gracefully steps forward.
This first section of the exhibit will include two sculptures from ancient time designed to highlight inspiration Canova drew from classical works. There are also numerous paintings depicting Hebe from a variety of international and Italian artists. Dance is the focus of the second section, inspired by Canova’s sculpture, Dancer with Finger on Chin. Created between 1809 and 1814 for a local banker, Domenico Manzoni, the work went missing following a break-in during which Mazoni was killed. Although never recovered, the original is today known through a beautiful plaster model by Canova and an accurate marble copy by another sculptor, Luigi Bienaime.
An extraordinary series of drawings and tempera works by Canova reveal the artist’s less known talents as a painter. The final section, entitled ‘Sculptor Philosopher’, opens with a Canova statue of Orpheus on loan from the Hermitage. It investigates how Canova explored the metaphysical subject of death and centres on the marble funerary monument he created for the murdered banker, inspired by classical Roman designs.
This section compares Canova’s interpretations with similar paintings and his experiments with bas-relief carvings, particularly a dramatic series showing the final hours of Socrates. Elsewhere, the show includes Canova’s stunning masterpiece of Cupid and Psyche, surrounded by other interpretations of the mythological lovers, by painters such as Angelica Kauffmann and Francesco Hayez.
Another section explores the relationship between Canova and the two great popes of the neoclassical age, Pius VI and his successor Pius VII, both of whom from Cesena, a town near Forli. The exhibition opens in Forli’s San Domenico Museum on January 25 and runs until June 21.
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