KALLOS GALLERY
LONDON
Wood figure of a man, Egyptian, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty
circa 1550 - 1307 BCWood
Height: 20.5 cm
Price: £35,000 plus any applicable taxes
The figure is in the form of young man standing with his arms held at his side. He is shown wearing a long kilt with a flaring overfold in front and a short wig with radiating striations. The eyes and the upper lids are well modelled, the proper left slightly higher than the right. There are some traces of pigment remaining, especially for the eyes; the feet are missing.
Provenance
Joseph Lindon Smith (1863 - 1950), New Hampshire, USA, acquired before 1950 Lindon Smith was an American painter, best known for his extraordinarily faithful and lively representations of antiquities, especially Egyptian tomb reliefs Christie’s, New York, 18 December 1996, lot 59
Literature
The types of funerary equipment that the ancient Egyptians put into their tombs had become standardised long before the New Kingdom. Based on the wealth and status of the deceased, provisions for burial included a container for the mummified remains, food offerings, protective figures and objects, servant statues (shabtis), furniture, tools, weapons, and clothing. In addition to being emblems of status and for symbolic use in the afterlife, some also were meant to aid in resurrection and to offer protection. Small wooden statuettes were often placed in tombs, in close proximity to the mummy and the statuette acted as an alternative resting place for the spirit of the deceased in the event of damage to the physical body.
For a similar example see Vandier, Manuel d’Archeologie egyptienne. III. Les Grandes Epoques. La Statuaire, pl. CXXXVIII, 4.
Large black-glazed nestoris, Greek, South Italy, mid- 4th century BC
Pottery
Height: 48.9 cm
Price: £30,000 plus any applicable taxes
Ovoid in form, with characteristic vertical handles rising from the shoulders to the rim and decorated with rotelles, with additional horizontal handles at the belly.
A wine vessel of an unusual form and rare in black glaze. The workshops of the potters and painters of southern Italy produced vases for a Greek clientele established in coastal colonies such as Taranto and Metaponte, as well as for the indigenous population. While most shapes in South Italian vase-painting have their origins in Attic models, the nestoris is indigenous.
The nestorides produced exclusively in Apulia and Lucania (regions in southern Italy) are divided into three categories, according to the evolution of the shape of the body and the handles. They are distinctive with two sets of handles: a pair of high arching handles as well as practical horizontal handles at the belly: A.D. Trendall, Red Figure Vases of South Italy and Sicily, London, 1989, pp. 10-11.
ProvenanceAmerican private collection, New York, acquired circa 1995 – 1996 Christie’s, New York, 6 December 2001, lot 483
American private collection, 2001 – 2019
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Founded in 2014 by Baron Lorne Thyssen-Bornemisza, Kallos Gallery is a London gallery specialising in ancient art. They offer a carefully curated selection of works from Antiquity, including Ancient Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Western Asiatic and European artefacts. They strive to maintain a great diversity of objects, but all united by a particular aesthetic quality inspired by their name Kallos, which means ‘beauty’. That may be the quality of a surface, the powerful form of a helmet, the line of a finely carved marble, the miniature detail of a gem or the draughtsmanship of a vase.
