Leonardo Marini (1730–1797) was an Italian sculptor who worked principally in Rome during the later decades of the eighteenth century, contributing to the rich culture of sculptural production that flourished in the city during the age of Neoclassicism. Born in 1730, Marini trained within the Roman tradition of marble carving and decorative sculpture, absorbing the technical standards demanded by a city whose churches, palaces, and aristocratic collections called for accomplished work in both religious and secular subjects.

Marini's career unfolded during one of the most intellectually charged periods in the history of Western art, when theorists such as Johann Joachim Winckelmann were redefining the aesthetic ideals of antiquity and spurring a generation of sculptors to seek clarity, restraint, and noble simplicity in their work. Marini responded to these currents while remaining rooted in the robust craft traditions of Italian Baroque sculpture, producing work that bridges the ornamental richness of that earlier style with the soberer ambitions of the emerging Neoclassical movement.

His works, which include portrait busts, decorative reliefs, and devotional sculpture, are found in Roman churches and collections. The portrait bust was a form in which he demonstrated particular facility, capturing the dignity and individuality of his sitters in the time-honored medium of carved marble. His ecclesiastical commissions reflect the continuing vitality of religious sculpture in Catholic Rome even as secular and antiquarian taste was reshaping the broader art world.

Though Marini is not among the most celebrated sculptors of his era — figures such as Antonio Canova would soon eclipse many of his contemporaries — his work represents a valuable chapter in the history of Roman sculpture in the eighteenth century. He died in 1797, leaving behind a modest but accomplished body of work that documents the transition from the Baroque to the Neoclassical in Italian sculpture.