LATE 18TH CENTURY, THE ORMOLU BASE CIRCA 1780

Joseph-Charles Marin was the pupil of Clodion, and a celebrated sculptor in his own right. Like his master, he specialized in delicately rendered terracotta figures and groups of secular subjects which appealed to the light-hearted atmosphere of late 18th century France. Nymphs and satyrs in playful, often revelrous, scenes are commonly found. The present figure of a reclining bacchante, is closely comparable to other terracotta figures by Marin, such as the signed group of a reclining bacchante with putti in the Musée du Petit Palais, Paris (illustrated in Clodion, op. cit., no. 95, pp. 408-411).