CAST BY FERDINAND BARBEDIENNE, FROM A MODEL BY ANTOINE-LOUIS BARYE, EARLY 20TH CENTURY

Conceived in 1849 and exhibited at the Salon the following year, Barye's second and final mythological work, Thésée combatant le Centaure Biénor, was edited posthumously by Barbedienne in no less than four reductions. Barbedienne also produced a three-metre cast of the model, which was to surmount the monument to Barye, designed by the architect, Stanislas Bernier, funded by American collectors, and erected on boulevard Henri IV on the Ile Saint-Louis, Paris, in 1894.