Franz Bergmann Cold Painted Bronze Miniature of Boxing Foxes

Product Details

Boxing foxes by Franz Xaver Bergmann*.  This charming miniature cold painted bronze figural group of boxing foxes is beautifully detailed, right down to the two coaches, a frog and a mouse, the towels on the braided ropes and the wood plank floor.  Whimsical perfection!

Impressed marks:  

the letter “B” in an urn shaped cartouche (Franz Bergman’s foundry mark) and GESCHUTZT AUSTRIA 

Geschutzt translates to English as “protected” as in, patent protected / registered.

Made in Vienna, Austria, early 20th century.

3 1/4” (8.2cm) square, 2 1/4” (5.7cm) high.

$1995.

* Franz Xaver Bergmann (1861-1936) was the owner of a Viennese foundry, specializing in highly detailed patinated and cold painted bronze figures; subjects including Oriental subjects, erotic tableaus and humanized, whimsical animal objets d’art. 

Franz Xaver Bergmann is the son of Franz Bergmann (1838-1894) who established a foundry in Vienna in 1860. Bergmann Jr. inherited this business and established a new foundry in 1900, both producing new work and continuing some of his father’s designs.

The Bergmann foundry work is usually signed with the letter “B” in an urn shaped cartouche (as is this example) but his erotic work is signed Namgreb (Bergmann in reverse).