Artist
Veronese Design
Veronese Design is a brand of decorative figurines in cold-cast resin with a bronze finish, producing mythological, gothic and figurative statuettes such as The Kiss of Death, a winged skeleton embracing a young woman.
1 work in the collection
Works by Veronese Design
Veronese Design (also listed as Veronese Designs, or simply Veronese) is not an individual artist but a brand of decorative statuettes, sold through gift shops and online retailers. Its pieces are made in cold-cast resin, a mixture of resin and powdered metal or stone that is poured into molds and then finished by hand, giving the look and some of the weight of bronze at a fraction of the cost. Retailers describe a catalogue of more than a thousand designs, from classical subjects such as Cupid and Psyche to animals, saints, soldiers and gothic fantasy. The individual designers are not usually named.
The Kiss of Death
The Kiss of Death is one of the brand's gothic figures, about 25 centimeters high. A winged skeleton bends over a young woman with long flowing hair, one bony hand at her back, and kisses her on the mouth; she reaches up and clings to its ribs rather than pulling away. Its great feathered wing curves around the pair like a canopy. The figures stand on a base carved with Celtic knotwork, and the whole group is painted in an antique bronze finish that picks out individual feathers and strands of hair.
The subject has a long ancestry. Death as a lover, or Death and the Maiden, was a favorite theme of German Renaissance artists such as Hans Baldung Grien, who showed a skeleton seizing a young woman, and it returned in Romantic music and Symbolist painting. In cemetery art the most famous modern example is El Petó de la Mort (1930) in Barcelona's Poblenou Cemetery, where a winged skeleton kisses a dying youth; the Veronese figure reverses the genders but keeps the wings and the kiss.
Where to find it
Veronese figurines are mass-produced decorative objects sold through retailers rather than held in museums. For the tradition behind them, see Danse Macabre and Death in Art.
Questions & answers
What is Veronese Design?
Veronese Design is a brand of decorative statuettes made in cold-cast resin, usually with a bronze finish. Its catalogue includes mythological, religious, animal and gothic figures sold through gift and online retailers; the individual designers are generally not named.
What is cold-cast bronze?
Cold-cast bronze is resin mixed with fine bronze powder, poured into a mold at room temperature and then polished and patinated so the surface looks like cast bronze, at much lower cost than foundry casting.
What does The Kiss of Death statue show?
It shows a winged skeleton kissing a young woman with long hair, who clings to it in return, on a base with Celtic knots. It belongs to the old theme of Death and the Maiden, in which Death appears as a lover.