Alexander Ancient Art

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Alexander Biesbroek

Alexander Ancient Art
Papelaan 65
2252 EE Voorschoten
The Netherlands

By appointment only

T +31 71 5614 015
M + 31 6 3360 3485

info@alexanderancientart.com
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Alexander Ancient Art was established by Egyptologist Alexander Biesbroek. He studied Egyptology at the universities of Utrecht and Leiden (the Netherlands). In 1986 he was offered a (part-time) post at Utrecht University, where he has been doing Egyptological research until 2003, when the whole department was closed, due to a cutback in the university budget.

Alexander has been a collector of ancient art since 1972. In 1986 he also started dealing in antiquities, which led to the establishment of the company in 1991. He has since worked as a consultant for collectors of ancient art worldwide, and has sold objects to many collectors and museums.

Alexander Ancient Art is a member of IADAA, LAPADA, CINOA and ADCAEA, and is exhibiting or has exhibited at major art fairs like BAAF Brussels, Parcours des Mondes Paris, BRUNEAF Brussels, Olympia Art & Antiques Fair London, and Winter B Sablon Brussels.

A Luristan terracotta bull with a vessel-like hollow body. There is an undulating snake on the back of the animal, its head emerging between the horns. Another snake is peeping from the darkness of the aperture in the chest. The eyes of the bull are composed of applied rings, those of the snakes are inlaid.
Early 1st millennium B.C.; height 39.3 cm, length 30.3 cm.

Exhibited: Paris, France, Musée du Petit Palais, October 1961 - January 1962; Essen, Germany, Villa Hügel, February - April 1962; Zürich, Switzerland, Kunsthaus, May - August 1962; The Hague, Netherlands, Haags Gemeentemuseum, September - November 1962; Vienna, Austria, Österreichisches Museum für angewandte Kunst, January - March 1963; British Museum, London, 1970s-1980s.

Published: Ghirshman, 7000 ans d'art en Iran (Paris, 1961), p. 47, no. 268; Ghirshman, "Notes Iraniennes XI. Le Rhyton en Iran", Artibus Asiae, Vol. 25, No. 1 (1962), p. 57-80; fig. 10; Hentze-Adams, "Gods and Drinking Serpents", History of Religions, Vol. 4, No. 2 (University of Chicago Press, 1965), p. 179-208; Belloni-Dall'Asèn, Iranian Art (London, 1969), plate 23.

Provenance: collection of prince Firouz, a member of the royal family of Iran (Qajar dynasty, overthrown by the Pahlevi dynasty in 1925), Teheran; later collection of princess Safiyeh Firouz, Paris; with Christie's London, 10 July 1991, lot 142; then Dutch private collection.