The Cybis studio occasionally took an individual element from a ‘group’ sculpture and offered it as a separate retail edition under a different name. They were almost always animal studies; for example, the buck in the White Tailed Deer trio was offered as the single Deer in Motion, and one of the Charging Buffaloes was also issued singly as the American White Buffalo. All of these are shown in Into the Woods with Cybis, and all of those “spinoffs” were limited editions.
Sometimes the individual element spinoff was offered as an open edition instead, as when Cybis took two of the cubs from the 1983 limited edition Mother Bear and Three Cubs and simultaneously offered one as the open-edition Tan Bear (and several years later again, in black, as the Black Bear.) Another cub was also issued later as the Bear Cub, Sitting. The original beagle pups Branigan and Clancy were separated about ten years later and only one was then offered as simply Beagle… even though the original pair was still in the active retail line.
However, Cybis has only twice disconnected a sculpture of a person in order to offer it separately. As seen in the Ballet post, the impressive and very limited edition sculpture Swan Lake’s Odette includes a female ballerina who was also offered as the separate edition Curtain Call. However, the decoration/colorway of Curtain Call differs from that of Odette even though their pose and sizes are identical.
IMPORTANT UPDATE, JULY 2024: It has been brought to my attention that at least one eBay seller has incorrectly offered a figure that became detached from a different Cybis edition as a “Lady Elizabeth.” Please be aware that if the figure does not have the Cybis signature and a Cybis sculpture number, that figure is NOT a Lady Elizabeth. It is instead merely a lady figure that has become detached from one of the circa-1980s Lady and the Unicorn sculptures. Such a detached figure will also likely have some remaining indication of where it was originally attached to the unicorn and/or to the porcelain base mold. It will definitely not have a sculpture number nor the Cybis signature, because on the Lady and the Unicorn sculptures these were applied only to the porcelain ‘base’ section. A true Lady Elizabeth will have both of those markings.
Having got that PSA out of the way, I will proceed with my discussion of the real Lady Elizabeth circa-1990s limited edition.
The only other officially-separate human figure was Lady Elizabeth who is 9.5″ high, and was issued as an edition of 1500 sometime between the autumn of 1996 and the spring of 1999. She is the ‘Lady’ mold which formed part of the Lady and the Unicorn limited-edition sculpture that was issued at least a decade earlier.
However, unlike Curtain Call (who has purple decorations on her dress and a purple crown, instead of being all in white like Odette) unfortunately the late-1990s Lady Elizabeth is absolutely identical in every way to her original appearance on the 1986 Lady and the Unicorn shown above! This obviously creates an identification problem. Therefore, if you are considering purchasing a piece that claims to be a Lady Elizabeth, please make sure that you have read the July 2024 Update that I added to the the first part of this post and that the figure being offered is properly signed and numbered. If you are at all uncertain about it, there is a contact-form link below.
This exact duplication of appearance seems very odd (and rather lazy!) especially when the subject is human. There’s certainly plenty of room for creativity in Lady Elizabeth‘s wardrobe, one would think. Instead of rust-and-green yet again, why not jewel tones of deep blue and scarlet? Or cool lavender and mauve? The poor girl didn’t even get a new pair of shoes, a different object to hold in her hand or even a different hair color, for heaven’s sake. What a missed opportunity!
Name Index of Cybis Sculptures
Visual Index (for human figures/busts only)
About the Cybis Reference Archive
What is Cybis?
Images of Cybis porcelain sculptures are provided for informational and educational purposes only. All photographs are copyrighted by their owner as indicated via watermark. Please see the copyright notice in the footer and sidebar for important information regarding the text that appears within this website.
The Cybis Archive is a continually-updated website that provides the most comprehensive range of information about Cybis within a single source. It is not and never has been part of the Cybis Porcelain studio, which is no longer in business.
THE CYBIS ARCHIVE 