BERLIN—In the solemn silence of the Bode Museum, I can almost hear the music as Antonio Canova’s nearly life-size sculpture titled “Dancing Girl With Cymbals” effortlessly twirls and pivots on one leg before me. She dances with a lightness seen only in flight, raising her hands above her head for drama and balance, while playing her cymbals. She wears a delicate classical-style dress that skims her body, emphasizing every lithe move she makes.
This dancer’s peaceful presence belies the sculpture’s tumultuous past, having almost been destroyed in a fire and then lost for nearly 130 years before being rediscovered by chance in 1979.
Neville Rowley, curator for early Italian art at the Sculpture Collection and Museum of Byzantine Art (Bode Museum), told me the sculpture’s remarkable story, and how Canova’s “Dancing Girl With Cymbals” came to be one of the highlights of their collection.
A Russian diplomat living in Vienna, Prince Andrey Razumovsky, first owned the sculpture. Razumovsky was a key negotiator in agreeing to the terms of the allies’ victory over Napoleon in 1815. He was also an ardent patron of the arts, supporting greats like Canova and Beethoven. (Beethoven first played his Symphony No. 5 at Razumovsky’s palace.)
But Canova’s “Dancing Girl With Cymbals” disappointed Razumovsky. Contemporary experts believed that ancient artists made pure white statuary, and a large black stain that ran across the dancer’s thighs went against the neoclassical style that aimed to revive that ancient tradition.
On December 30, 1814, just a few months after Razumovsky received the sculpture, disaster struck. Fire destroyed his palace, yet somehow men managed to pull Canova’s dancer to safety minutes before the palace roof collapsed. Remarkably, the sculpture suffered only a few broken fingers, but the fire meant its black thigh-stain became blackened further from soot.
Canova’s Enduring Legacy
October 2022 marks the 200th anniversary of Canova’s death. In the late 18th century, Canova first worked in Venice but he made his name in Rome, becoming the greatest neoclassical sculptor of his time. He had invitations from many European heads of state to come work for them, but he stayed firmly on Roman soil, where he felt most inspired.Canova’s neoclassical-style sculptures are rooted in ancient art. According to “A World History of Art,” by Hugh Honour and John Fleming, Canova “was hailed as the continuer of the ancient Greek tradition, the modern Phidias [ancient Greek sculptor.]” He was particularly inspired by paintings on ancient Greek vases, and by frescoes found in Herculaneum, the ancient southern Italian city that was discovered in 1709 (some 40 years before the discovery of nearby Pompeii).
In addition to being inspired by ancient art, Canova loved dance, and several of his works reflect this love. His friend, the sculptor Antonio d’Este wrote of how, as youths, they’d wander into the mountains on feast days to watch the girls dance. He wrote how Canova enjoyed “the innocence of the dancers, … [and] by observing the natural movements of these girls, he again and again drew a lesson that benefited his art.”
Great artists like Canova made the impossible possible. Canova excelled at making static marble sculptures full of movement from every viewing angle. He did that in his “Dancing Girl With Cymbals,” and he somehow made the dancer’s solid marble body appear as light as a feather, making it easy for me and other Bode Museum visitors to “hear” the music she dances to.
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