Lot Essay
As a successful sculptor, painter and illustrator, Louis Chalon began exhibiting at the Salon in 1887 and later studied under Lefebvre and Boulanger at the École des Beaux-Arts, winning several medals throughout his career. The present mirror in the Art Nouveau style is most closely related to Chalon’s La Pieuvre, expressively modeled with a dancer with an octopus at her feet. Originally exhibited at the 1899 Paris Salon, the most recent example of La Pieuvre sold at Freeman’s, Philadelphia, 7 October 2009, lot 972 ($53,800).