This life-sized marble bust depicts the Cardinal as a middle-aged man in his clerical garb. His face appears somewhat chubby and he sports a mustache and goatee.
The Museum's website for this sculpture (
visit link) informs us:
"Cardinal Scipione Borghese (1577–1633)
Giuliano Finelli
(Italian, Carrara 1601–1653 Rome)
Date: 1631–32
Culture: Italian, Rome
Medium: Marble
Dimensions: Overall (confirmed): H. 32 1/4 x W. 30 7/8 x D. 16 in., Wt. 333lb. (81.9 x 78.4 x 40.6 cm, 151.0478kg); Overall height including socle (confirmed): 38 1/2 in. (97.8 cm); Pedestal: H. 48 1/4 x Circum. 11 3/4 x W. 17 x D. 17 in. (122.6 x 29.8 x 43.2 x 43.2 cm)
Classification: Sculpture
Credit Line: Purchase, Louisa Eldridge McBurney Gift, 1953
Accession Number: 53.201
On view in Gallery 601
Cardinal Scipione Borghese (1577–1633) was the influential nephew of Pope Paul V and an enthusiastic and refined art collector. A document of 1632 records the payment to Finelli for this portrait bust, originally intended for the Villa Borghese in Rome. Finelli was a pupil of Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598–1680) and a sculptor known for his remarkable skill at carving marble."
Wikipedia (
visit link) adds:
"Scipione Borghese (1 September 1577 – 2 October 1633) was an Italian Cardinal, art collector and patron of the arts. A member of the Borghese family, he was the patron of the painter Caravaggio and the artist Bernini. His legacy is the establishment of the art collection at the Villa Borghese in Rome...
Scipione received many honours from his uncle. He became superintendent general of the Papal States, legate in Avignon, archpriest of the Lateran and Vatican basilicas, prefect of the Signature of Grace, Abbot of Subiaco and San Gregorio da Sassola on the Coelian, and librarian of the Roman Catholic Church. He also assumed the offices of Grand penitentiary, secretary of the Apostolic Briefs, Archbishop of Bologna, protector of Germany and the Habsburg Netherlands, of the Orders of Dominicans, Camaldolese and Olivetans, of the Shrine of Loreto and of the Swiss Guard, and numerous other ecclesiastical positions. In each of these offices the cardinal received stipends. His income in 1609 was about 90,000 scudi, and by 1612 it had reached 140,000 scudi. With his enormous wealth, he bought the villages of Montefortino and Olevano Romano from Pier Francesco Colonna, Duke of Zagarolo for 280,000 scudi.
As Cardinal Nephew (an official post until it was abolished in 1692), Borghese was placed in charge of both the internal and external political affairs of the Papal States. In addition, Paul V entrusted his nephew with the management of the finances of both the papacy and the Borghese family."