Ercole Lelli (Bologna, 1702 – 1766) was an Italian anatomist, sculptor, painter, and wax modeller.
The plaster model was made by Ercole Lelli as a preparatory study for the creation of the two larger lime wood 'flayed' figures, used as telamons supporting the canopy of the Reader's chair at the Anatomical Theatre of the Archiginnasio in Bologna. The statue represents a 'skinned' man, i.e., deprived of his cutaneous and fascial coverings, to show the most superficial muscles.
An artist with an eclectic personality, Lelli ventured into many disciplines, from painting to sculpture, from engraving to wax modelling, a field in which he achieved the best and most lasting results. Son of Domenico Maria, one of the most talented and renowned gunsmiths of the time, he began working in his father's workshop as a boy. Soon his natural inclination for drawing brought him closer to painting, so after having tried in vain to enter the school of Giovan Gioseffo Dal Sole, he was taken to study by Giovan Pietro Zanotti. It was Zanotti who directed his interests, in addition to painting, to anatomical studies. In 1734, following the creation of the two 'flayed' figures, Lelli achieved a well-deserved fame that launched an intense and rewarding career in public institutions. His institutional activity was intimately linked to the figure and cultural policy of the Bolognese cardinal Lambertini, who became Pope with the name of Benedict XIV in 1740. Lelli was aggregated among the Clementine academics, appointed 'director of figure', and his name was proposed by Benedict XIV for the creation of all the wax preparations which he finished in 1751. For more than ten years his reformist ideas contributed to the renewal of the Clementine Academy, but in 1758, following the death of Benedict XIV, his protector, his fame began to falter and his activities decreased significantly.
H approximately 50 cm - base 24x14 cm.
