any idea on the maker of this old lamp? or who the subject is?

Can you determine what the material of the figure is?

 

Prometheus?

 

I'd think Prometheus too. Bringing fire to the world. Here he is in Rockefeller Center doing same.

Debora

 

A quick question....is it that discolored or did you over-brighten the image for us.........? VERY COOL lamp!!!!

 

Shade is likely Czech.

 

Figure has a laurel wreath in the right hand. This is a common way of indicating Victory. May be an allegorical figure rather than a mythological one. Shades of the Olympic torch.

Start the groaning now.

 

Prometheus was also known to carry a laurel branch.

Debora

 

No groaning. It then could be a post WWI lamp.

 

I was not aware of this. Can you find me an image of him with a wreath or branch? Searches give more instances of Prometheus Bound, but of the ones I could find of him descending with the torch he is wreathless.

The globe fits with either interpretation.

 

In the Victory vein ...
https://www.antiques-atlas.com/antique/french_spelter_lamp_le_triumphe_l_moreau/as237a1110

 

From the listing:

The lamp depicts the allegorical figure of Victory, modelled as a nude youth with draperies, his arms outstretched, an olive branch in his right hand and the torch that holds the flambeau shade in his left. This figure is often seen simply as a spelter figure except he has two laurel wreaths in his left hand and is otherwise identical.

He has a laurel branch in his right hand & the torch in his left. I see no wreaths except he may be wearing one. Fortunately the piece carries its own identification.

 

I'd buy that (figuratively.) Prometheus is usually portrayed as a muscular man rather than a youth Here's something that associates him with laurel, by way. Thoughts welcome.

"Prometheus: Titan son of Iapetus, brother of Epimetheus, and bringer of fire to humanity. For serving the gods a false sacrificial meal he was chained to the Caucasus for millennia, an eagle or vulture picking at his liver every night. Once liberated he wore a chunk of the mountain set in a ring and a laurel leaf around his head in remembrance of the authority of Olympus."

Debora

 

That's a version of Prometheus' crime I had not heard before, including the wearing of a wreath.

In the relief carving, the foliage behind Prometheus is probably meant to be olive, strongly associated with Athena. When he is done with his modeling, Athena will endow the man figure with a soul.

 

@Bronwen, I bow to your superior scholarship.

Debora

 

It's not much compared to the people who really know this stuff. It's just that certain features/attributes are used repeatedly to symbolize qualities of the subject. It's kind of a language & I have been trying for some years now to learn it.

That dratted scene of Athena in a woodland clearing, surrounded by shepherds & nymphs, is still plaguing me. There's a whole paper that could be written about the way she is standing.

 

The one I show at the top is made of spelter