Henri-Émile Allouard (1849-1929) painter and sculptor, exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1865 to 1928. He studied under Lequesne and Schanewerck, and in his sculptural oeuvre worked in a variety of materials from terracotta, bronze, marble to ivory and precious metals. He exhibited his works widely, including the Universal Exhibitions of 1889 and 1900, winning a gold medal in the latter. He executed monumental marbles as well as portrait busts and small scale statuettes. He was a member of the Jury for Sculpture and Decorative Arts from 1889.
Allouard's work ranges from subjects such as Richelieu of 1912 and Molière mourant of 1885 to exotic precious figurines such as Héloïse au paraclet in stone, marble and ivory of 1896, La Sieste in ivory, marble and bronze of 1907 and La Cruche cassée in ivory, marble and stone. Many of his works were produced in porcelain by Sèvres and in bronze by several Parisian founders. It is interesting to note that a version of the Assyrienne is illustrated in Rheims (op. cit.), but is signed Fattorini, this non-documented Italian may have been one of Allouard's studio carvers, who was charged with executing a further version due to the popularity of the work. The present marble belongs to the fin de siècle taste for the exotic. It relates to Allouard's other masterpiece, the Femme Foulah in bronze and striated coloured marble of 1904 representing a nubile maiden from Guinea. Both share a richly jewelled ornamentation, an interest in foreign racial types and a heady sensuousness akin to the work of Gérôme. The present Assyrienne follows in the earlier Symbolist tradition of Ancient femmes fatales begining with Salammbô and Salome, and the sculptor has carefully enriched the figure with an antiquarian's detail, from the jewellery and plumed fan to the winged bull. Arch and sophisticated the present figure is an alluring image, finely carved and imaginatively conceived in life size.