Sleeping putto

A well-nourished toddler with typical "chubby folds" lies asleep on his back, legs crossed, on a softly draped cloth. The boy's eyes are closed, his 'breathing' mouth slightly ajar, the left arm placed sideways around his head, while the right arm rests relaxed on the bed. The fresh, completely relaxed body was captured with plastic empathy, and the child's psyche was depicted with vertical precision. An interpretation as an allegory of sleep is obvious, but not necessarily from an iconographic perspective. The subject of the Sleeping Boy resonates with the inventions of François Duquesnoy, who was praised by his contemporaries as the "fattore di putti." The present sculpture in ivory was probably mounted on a wooden stand. Carvings of putti in ivory originate from antiquites when these figures were already being set in marble.