Bronze statuette. In the early 1740s John Michael Rysbrack made a series of three full-length terracotta statuettes representing Rubens, van Dyke and Fiamingo Quenoy, all three of whom, like the sculptor himself, came from Flanders. George Vertue wrote in praise of the sculptures in 1743:
â€the gracefulness of the Actions the dispositions of their habit, attitudes, and natural likeness, is most excellent. Q[uestion] if any other Artist living could do better and more masterly execute them.’
In 1744, the â€Daily Advertiser’ announced a proposal to cast the statuettes in Plaster of Paris and invited subscribers to order the set for seven and a half guineas. It appears Joseph van Aken, a drapery painter who had travelled to England from Antwerp at about the same time as Rysbrack, had purchased the original terracotta models from the sculptor and was in partnership with him in this financial venture. This bronze version was presumably cast later from the Plaster of Paris statuette.
