"The Misses Esterhazy": a New-Found Work by Lorenzo Bartolini

In 1929, the Louvre sent an anonymous group thought to have come from the Chauchard collection on long-term loan to Compiegne. In fact, it was a marble by Lorenzo Bartolini, acquired by the Civil List in 1866. The identity of the seller, Marchioness Boccella, accredits the idea that it is a portrait of two illegitimate daughters of Prince Nikolaus II Esterhazy: Natalia (future Countess von Lowenberg, born in 1811) and Verginia (future Marchioness Boccella, born in 1812). The group was commissioned from Bartolini while the prince was on a visit to Florence and was delivered to Vienna in 1823. Nikolaus II Esterhazy was well known as a collector of paintings, but he was also interested in the sculptors of his time and most of the pieces in his "museum" went to the imperial and royal collections in Vienna, in 1843.