TIETZ, Adam Ferdinand
(1708-1777)

Mercury

1758
Sandstone, about life-size
Garden of former Electoral Palace, Trier

As court sculptor in Würzburg, Bamberg, and Trier, Adam Ferdinand Tietz was occupied mainly in producing garden figures of sandstone. At Seehof Palace near Bamberg, Tietz and his workshop had turned out four hundred statues by the time they finished work on the project.

The subject of this pieces was that of classical mythology, which outside the ecclesiastical realm enjoyed a considerable freedom of expression. Tietz's numerous figures of Mercury illustrate the almost sunny lightness and sense of movement which typify his figures in the taste of the time.