CAST BY SUSSE FRÈRES, PARIS, FROM THE MODEL BY LOUIS-ERNEST BARRIAS, EARLY 20TH CENTURY

Barrias's most celebrated work, an homage to advances made in scientific exploration, first appeared in marble at the Paris Salon of 1893 by its lengthier title 'La Nature mystérieuse et voil se découvre devant la Science' (no. 2543) and was fittingly acquired by the faculty at l'Ecole de Médecine in Bordeaux. The figure resurfaced at the 1899 Salon simply titled 'La Nature se dèvoilant' (no. 3186), executed in polychrome marble and Algerian onyx. The first bronze casts exhibited by Susse were shown in various sizes and to great critical acclaim at the 1900 Exposition Universelle. At the Liège Exhibition of 1905, the renowned bronzier Théodore Millet deemed the model a tour de force for the Susse firm and proclaimed it 'the finest of the works exhibited'.