CAST BY GOUPIL & CIE., PARIS, FROM MODELS BY MARIUS-JEAN-ANTONIN MERCIÉ COPIED FROM PAINTINGS BY JEAN-LÉON GÉRÔME, LAST QUARTER 19TH CENTURY

Inspired by Jean-Léon Gérôme's 1863 canvas L'Almée (or Danse du ventre) and his now lost 1875 masterpiece Danse du sabre chez un Pacha, this pair of figures by Marius-Jean-Antonin Mercié are the result of a brilliant partnership fostered by Maison Goupil in 1875. Upon seeing the success of Gérôme's Danse du sabre, a figure he painted on two occasions in 1875, Adolphe Goupil, dealer and father-in-law of Gérôme, sought to join the artists to ensure greater success through sculpted forms. Goupil insisted on recruiting only the most celebrated artists of the time and Mercié appeared an obvious choice following the overwhelming response to a plaster model of his fêted Gloria Victis at the 1874 Salon. Goupil managed to secure the artist to produce the bronze models only a year later.