By Livia Lupi
Neo-Classical sculptor Ulisse Cambi was born in Florence on 22 September 1807. He studied sculpture in his native town at the Accademia di Belle Arti, and then in Rome. After his return to Florence, he taught at the same Accademia where he was himself educated, obtaining national and international recognition.
In works like the Little Fisherman on top of the fountain in Piazza Duomo in Prato, Cambi achieved grace and naturalism, but in celebrative sculptures, like Carlo Goldoni’s statue in Florence, he demonstrated his adherence to the more rigid and imposing canons of the Academy.
Amongst Cambi’s students are the Sienese sculptor, engraver and writer Giovanni Dupré and painter and sculptor Giorgio Ceragioli, both influential nineteenth-century artists. Cambi died in Florence on 7 April 1895.
Reference: Francesco Neri Arnoldi, “Cambi, Ulisse,” Dizionario Biografico, Enciclopedia Treccani.
Further reading: Sandra Berresford, Robert W. Fichter and Robert Freidus, Italian Memorial Sculpture 1820-1940: A Legacy of Love (2004).
Daphnis and Chloe, 1834, Pitti Palace. Marble.
Bust of Arnolfo di Cambio with Epigraphy, 1843, Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence. Marble.
Benvenuto Cellini, 1845, Loggia of the Uffizi. Marble.
Little Fisherman’s Fountain (Fontana del Pescatorello), 1863. Piazza Duomo, Prato. Marble.
Little Fisherman’s Fountain (Fontana del Pescatorello), detail.
Carlo Goldoni, 1873, Florence. Marble.