Lot 171

Ignác František Platzer (1717 - 1787) SAINT JOHN NEPOMUK

A sketch of a statue of St. John of Nepomuk, the larger version of which comes from the decoration of the Premonstratensian monastery in Teplá. It was created in the 1750s. It depicts the greatest saint of the Czech Baroque with one foot forward, while the other, according to traditional iconography, rests on either a shell, a fish, or a river wave. In a later version, John of Nepomuk holds a book in his left hand with a biretta resting on it. Platzer's work is characterized by physical sensuality and fullness of form - the author succeeded in uniquely combining the domestic High Baroque tradition with Viennese Classicism. František Ignác Platzer was a Czech late Baroque sculptor and woodcarver, a member of a family of woodcarvers from western Bohemia. He trained in Vienna and founded a large workshop in Prague, which supplied entire sets of woodcarving and stone carving decorations for churches, monasteries, castles, and castle gardens throughout Bohemia for more than 150 years, until the beginning of the 20th century.