CIRCLE OF ROBERT LE LORRAIN (1666-1743), CIRCA 1700

These two bronze figures, probably intended to represent attendants at the Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne, clearly originate in the immediate circle of Robert Le Lorrain. Le Lorrain, who worked extensively for Louis XIV, was the author of a bacchante in bronze which is known from a reference of 1699 and an engraving of 1704 (Souchal, op. cit., p. 334), and which corresponds to the present figure with only slight variations. Here, she has been paired with a satyr which is loosely based upon an antique marble. A number of similar satyrs, in both bronze and marble, were executed by French artists in and around Paris in the latter decades of Louis XIV's reign.