Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux

Exhibited by Galerie Malaquais

Material Terracotta and plaster

Dimensions 78 × 21.5 × 35 cm

Status Vetted

About the Work

The last original terracotta work of this size and importance, L'Amour moqueur is an exceptional testimony that allows us to enter the intimacy of Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux's studio. Left unfinished due to the advanced stage of the sculptor's illness, the work retains the artist's fingerprints in the balls of clay agglomerated around the potence, which is also visible, as well as those of the cloths used to keep the clay moist. These moving traces offer a glimpse behind the scenes and reveal the stages of the mysterious process of creating a sculpted work.

L'Amour moqueur was conceived as the counterpart to L'Amour blessé, a work representing the sculptor's eldest son and exhibited at the 1874 Salon, where Prince Georges B. Stirbey, Carpeaux's last patron, acquired it for his château in Bécon. This original, unique terracotta sculpture was then reproduced in terracotta, plaster and bronze by Susse Frères.

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Provenance

Provenance :
Louise Clément-Carpeaux (1872-1961), the artist’s daughter ;
Auction Sale, Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, Me Henri Baudoin, 11 December 1925, #29 ;
Maurice-Alphonse Renouard-Larivière (1854-1930) ;
Jean Renouard-Larivière (1891-1977), his son, husband of Dolores de Yturbe (1903-1992), by descent ;
Auction Sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, Thierry de Maigret, 27 March 2019, #222 ;
Paris, Galerie Talabardon & Gautier ;
European Collection.