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Lot Essay
Jean-Baptiste Pigalle was, along with Étienne-Maurice Falconet and Augustin Pajou, one of the most pre-eminent French sculptors in mid 18th-century France. He trained with both Robert Le Lorrain and Jean-Baptiste II Lemoyne, and after leaving their workshops studied at the Académie de France in Rome between 1736 and circa 1739. After leaving Rome he had a brief sèjour in Lyon, which is where he seemingly conceived the model of Mercury Attaching his Winged Sandals. He soon after returned to Paris and upon exhibiting the model at the Salon of 1742 won instant acclaim. The work was such a success that he was made a junior member (agréé) of the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture. To date this model is one of Pigalle's best-known works, and it proved to be such a success that shortly after its conception Pigalle decided to pair it with the model of Venus, an example of which is offered in the present lot.
It appears that Pigalle favoured the crafting works of allegorical or contemporary themes such as his much-adored pair of marbles entitled L'Enfant à la Cage and La Fillette à l'oiseau et à la pomme (1784) as well as his highly controvertial but incredibly powerful marble of Voltaire (1776), where the latter is depicted as a naked and emaciated old man (Gaborit, op. cit., pp, 48-55 and 70-74 respectively). His forté, however, remained in the carving of delicate and sentimental subject matters. Like his acquaintance Falconet (see note to lot 3), who also trained at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Pigalle was accomplished in the carving of the female figure; as his figures of Mme Pompadour as Charity and Love kissing Charity both in the Louvre, Paris demonstrate (Gaborit, op. cit., pp. 56- 8 and 59-61 respectively).
In the model of Venus, such as the marble in the present lot, Pigalle has chosen to depict a full female nude. The composition is quietly seductive; Venus sits cross-legged on a swirling cloud with two cooing doves to her right while also modestly covering herself. She faces to her left, gazing seductively to Mercury, with whom she would have been paired.
Pigalle conceived a number of variations of this model, and indeed of the pair. The earliest known paired groups are dateable to circa 1746 and are on a similar scale to the present lot. It seems, however, that he was later instructed by Louis XV to reproduce the models on a much larger scale and with certain variations for Frederick II of Prussia inspite of his reluctance to do so. These marbles can now be found in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (Gaborit, ibid., p. 44 and 47). Pigalle maintained throughout his career that he was never entirely satisfied with the modifications to the models, so he later returned to reproducing them on the smaller scale. Examples of these subsequent versions can now be found in the James de Rothschild collection at Waddesdon (Hodgkinson, op. cit., no. 25) and the Louvre (Gaborit, op. cit., p. 39), a further pair in plaster can also be found in the Cottonian collection at the Plymouth Museum and Art gallery, where the figure of Venus is of an identical size to the one in the present lot. Taking into account the fact that our marble is dated 1749, three years after the prototypes were paired and one year after the execution of the marbles for Frederick II, it is reasonable to assume that our marble was conceived by Pigalle, or one of his chief workshop assistants, at the time when the model was most widely recognised and that Pigalle was happily returning to the production of the original model.
It appears that Pigalle favoured the crafting works of allegorical or contemporary themes such as his much-adored pair of marbles entitled L'Enfant à la Cage and La Fillette à l'oiseau et à la pomme (1784) as well as his highly controvertial but incredibly powerful marble of Voltaire (1776), where the latter is depicted as a naked and emaciated old man (Gaborit, op. cit., pp, 48-55 and 70-74 respectively). His forté, however, remained in the carving of delicate and sentimental subject matters. Like his acquaintance Falconet (see note to lot 3), who also trained at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Pigalle was accomplished in the carving of the female figure; as his figures of Mme Pompadour as Charity and Love kissing Charity both in the Louvre, Paris demonstrate (Gaborit, op. cit., pp. 56- 8 and 59-61 respectively).
In the model of Venus, such as the marble in the present lot, Pigalle has chosen to depict a full female nude. The composition is quietly seductive; Venus sits cross-legged on a swirling cloud with two cooing doves to her right while also modestly covering herself. She faces to her left, gazing seductively to Mercury, with whom she would have been paired.
Pigalle conceived a number of variations of this model, and indeed of the pair. The earliest known paired groups are dateable to circa 1746 and are on a similar scale to the present lot. It seems, however, that he was later instructed by Louis XV to reproduce the models on a much larger scale and with certain variations for Frederick II of Prussia inspite of his reluctance to do so. These marbles can now be found in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (Gaborit, ibid., p. 44 and 47). Pigalle maintained throughout his career that he was never entirely satisfied with the modifications to the models, so he later returned to reproducing them on the smaller scale. Examples of these subsequent versions can now be found in the James de Rothschild collection at Waddesdon (Hodgkinson, op. cit., no. 25) and the Louvre (Gaborit, op. cit., p. 39), a further pair in plaster can also be found in the Cottonian collection at the Plymouth Museum and Art gallery, where the figure of Venus is of an identical size to the one in the present lot. Taking into account the fact that our marble is dated 1749, three years after the prototypes were paired and one year after the execution of the marbles for Frederick II, it is reasonable to assume that our marble was conceived by Pigalle, or one of his chief workshop assistants, at the time when the model was most widely recognised and that Pigalle was happily returning to the production of the original model.