Giambologna's closest collaborator, Antonio Susini founded his own workshop in Florence in 1600 and continued to cast bronzes from models made earlier by Giambologna, an important sixteenth-century sculptor. The quality of the casting and the sharp, precise chasing of this bronze suggest that it derives from a wax model that Susini carefully reworked before casting.
This bronze is one of only two known casts bearing Susini's signature: "'ANT SVSINI FIORE. OPVS." The animated group, inspired by a monumental Greco-Roman marble and showing the lion ripping the flesh on the horse's back with the horse's head thrust back in agony, captures a climactic moment in a violent drama.
Artist after Giovanni da Bologna, Italian, 1529-1608
Maker Antonio Susini, Italian, 1580-1624
Title
  • Lion Attacking Horse
Date ca. between 1580 and 1590
Medium Bronze, red lacquer
Dimensions Overall: 12 × 10 inches (30.5 × 25.4 cm)
Credit Line City of Detroit Purchase
Accession Number 25.20
Department European Sculpture and Dec Arts
On View European: Medieval and Renaissance W231, Level 2 (see map)
Signed Signed, on base: ANTo. SVSINI | FLORE. OPVS.
1925, Julius F. Goldschmidt (Goldschmidt Galleries, New York, New York, USA);
1925-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)
Valentiner, W.R. "A Bronze Group by Antonio Susini." Bulletin of the DIA 6, no. 7 (1925): pp. 72-73 (ill.).

Valentiner, W.R. "Another signed bronze by Antonio Susini," BURLINGTON MAGAZINE, vol. 41, p. 315

Wentzel, ZEITSCHRIFT FUR KUNSTGESCHICHTE, vol. 3, 1943-44, p. 55

Weihrauch, Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, DIE BILDWERKE IN BRONZE, 1956, p. 96

Avery, C., and Radcliffe, A., eds, GIAMBOLOGNA 1529-1608: SCULPTOR TO THE MEDICI, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1978, no. 170, pp. 186-187 (ill)

Avery, C., Radcliffe, A., and Leithe-Jasper, M., eds, GIAMBOLOGNA 1529-1608: EIN WENDEPUNKT DER EUROPAISCHEN PLASTIK, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna,
1979, no. 133, p. 220 (ill)

Center for the Fine Arts, Miami, FL, IN QUEST OF EXCELLENCE, January 14 - April 22, 1984, no. 43, p. 92 (ill)

Darr, A.P., "A Valentiner Legacy: Italian Sculpture in Detroit," APOLLO, vol. 124, no. 298, December 1986, pp. 481, 484, no. 21

Leithe-Jasper, M., RENAISSANCE MASTER BRONZES FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE KUNSTHISTORISCHES MUSEUM, VIENNA, 1986, London: Scala Publications Ltd, pp. 226-228, no. 58

Avery, C., Giambologna: The Complete Sculpture, Oxford & Mt. Kisco, New York, 1987, p. 284

MASTERPIECES FROM THE DETROIT INSTITUTE OF ARTS, Tokyo: Bunkamura Museum of Art, 1989, cat. no. 13, (ill)

Radcliffe, A., The Robert H. Smith collection: bronzes 1500-1600, London: 1994, pp. 62,65, 66-9, no. 11.

A. P. Darr, P. Barnet, A. Boström, with contributions by C. Avery... [et. al.], Catalogue of Italian Sculpture in the Detroit Institute of Arts, London: Harvey Miller Publishers, in assoc. with the Detroit Institute of Arts, 2002, 2 vols., I, cat. 110