French sculptor (1716?1791)
Etienne Maurice Falconet
(1 December 1716 ? 24 January 1791) was a French
baroque
,
rococo
and
neoclassical
sculptor, best-known for his equestrian statue of
Peter the Great
, the
Bronze Horseman
(1782), in St. Petersburg, Russia, and for the small statues he produced in series for the
Royal Sevres Porcelain Manufactory
[1]
[2]
Life and work
[
edit
]
Falconet was born to a poor family in
Paris
. He was at first apprenticed to a marble-cutter, but some of his clay and wood figures, with the making of which he occupied his leisure hours, attracted the notice of the sculptor
Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne
, who made him his pupil.
[3]
One of his most successful early sculptures was of
Milo of Croton
, which secured his admission to the membership of the
Academie royale de peinture et de sculpture
in 1754.
[4]
He came to prominent public attention in the
Salons
of 1755 and 1757 with his marbles of
L'Amour
(Cupid) and the
Nymphe descendant au bain
(also called
The Bather
), which is now at the
Louvre
.
[5]
In 1757 Falconet was appointed by the
Marquise de Pompadour
as director of the sculpture atelier of the new
Manufacture royale de porcelaine
at
Sevres
,
[6]
where he brought new life to the manufacture of unglazed
soft-paste porcelain
figurines, small-scale sculptures that had been a specialty at the predecessor of the Sevres manufactory,
Vincennes
.
The influence of the painter
Francois Boucher
and of contemporary theater
[7]
and ballet are equally in evidence in Falconet's subjects, and in his sweet, elegantly erotic, somewhat coy manner. Right at the start, in the 1750s, Falconet created for Sevres a set of white
biscuit
porcelain
garnitures
of tabletop
putti
(Falconet's
"Enfants"
) illustrating "the Arts," and meant to complement the manufacture's grand dinner service ("
Service du Roy
").
[8]
The fashion for similar small table sculptures spread to most of the porcelain manufacturies of Europe.
He remained at the Sevres post until he was invited to Russia by
Catherine the Great
in September 1766. At
St Petersburg
he executed a colossal statue of
Peter the Great
in bronze, known as the
Bronze Horseman
, together with his pupil and then daughter-in-law
Marie-Anne Collot
.
[9]
In 1788, back in Paris, he became Assistant
Rector
of the Academie royale de peinture et de sculpture.
[10]
Many of Falconet's religious works, commissioned for churches, were destroyed at the time of the
French Revolution
.
[4]
His work on private commissions fared better.
He found time to study
Greek
and
Latin
, and also wrote several essays on art:
Denis Diderot
confided to him the chapter on "Sculpture" in the
Encyclopedie
,
[11]
[12]
released separately by Falconet as
Reflexions sur la sculpture
in 1768. Three years later, he published
Observations sur la statue de Marc-Aurele
, which may be interpreted as the artistic program for his statue of Peter the Great. Falconet's writings on art, his
Oeuvres litteraires
, came to six volumes when they were first published, at
Lausanne
, in 1781?1782.
[4]
His extensive correspondence with
Diderot
,
[13]
where he argued that the artist works out of inner necessity rather than for future fame, and that with Empress
Catherine the Great
of Russia
[14]
reveal a great deal about his work and his beliefs about art.
Falconet's somewhat prettified and too easy charm incurred the criticism of the
Encyclopædia Britannica
's eleventh edition
:
"His artistic productions are characterized by the same defects as his writings, for though manifesting considerable cleverness and some power of imagination, they display in many cases a false and fantastic taste, the result, most probably, of an excessive striving after originality."
[4]
Hermann Goring
stole Falconet's
Friendship of the Heart
stahl
Hermann Goring
from the
Rothschild
collection at Paris for the art collection of his
Carinhall
hunting lodge.
[15]
In 2001/2002, when the Musee de Ceramique at Sevres mounted an exhibition of Falconet's production for Sevres, 1757?1766, its subtitle was "l'art de plaire" ("the art of pleasing").
[1]
Family
[
edit
]
The painter
Pierre-Etienne Falconet
(1741?91) was his son.
[16]
A draftsman and engraver, he provided illustrations to his father's entry on "Sculpture" for the Diderot
Encyclopedie
.
[6]
Further reading
[
edit
]
- Etienne-Maurice Falconet,
Oeuvres completes
3 volumes (Paris: Dentu, 1808 and Geneve: Slatkine Reprints, 1970)
- Louis Reau,
Etienne-Maurice Falconet
(Paris: Demotte, 1922)
- Anne Betty Weinshenker,
Falconet: His Writings and his Friend Diderot
(Geneve: Droz, 1966)
- George Levitine,
The Sculpture of Falconet
(Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, 1972)
- Alexander M. Schenker,
The Bronze Horseman: Falconet's Monument to Peter the Great
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003)
Notes
[
edit
]
- ^
Encyclopedia Britannica
on-line
- ^
Encyclopedie Larousse en ligne
- ^
Levitine, George (1972).
The Sculpture of Falconet
. Greenwich, Connecticut: New York Graphic Society. pp. 9?10.
ISBN
0821203835
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
public domain
:
Chisholm, Hugh
, ed. (1911). "
Falconet, Etienne Maurice
".
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 141.
- ^
Levitine, pp. 30-33.
- ^
a
b
Turner, Jane, ed. (1996). "Falconet, Etienne-Maurice".
Dictionary of Art
. Vol. 10. London: Macmillan. pp. 763?765.
ISBN
1884446000
.
- ^
Levitine, pp. 41, 43.
- ^
Pinot de Villechenon, Marie-Noelle (2001). "Un sculpteur au royaume de la porcelaine".
Falconet a Sevres, 1757-1766, ou, L'art de plaire
(in French). Paris: Reunion des musees nationaux. pp. 19?20.
ISBN
2711841707
.
- ^
Levitine, pp. 18, 19.
- ^
Levitine, p. 20.
- ^
Frank A. Kafker:
Notices sur les auteurs des dix-sept volumes de " discours " de l'Encyclopedie. Recherches sur Diderot et sur l'Encyclopedie.
1989, Volume 7, Numero 7, p. 140
- ^
Kafker, Frank A. (1989).
"Notices sur les auteurs des dix-sept volumes de " discours " de l'Encyclopedie"
.
Recherches sur Diderot et sur l'Encyclopedie
.
7
(7): 140 – via Persee.
- ^
Benot, Yves (1958).
Diderot et Falconet: le Pour et le Contre
(in French). Paris: Les Editeurs Francais Reunis.
- ^
Reau, Louis (1921).
Correspondance de Falconet avec Catherine II
(in French). Paris: Champion.
- ^
Baureithel, Ulrike (2020).
"Kunst - Sind Sie der Messias?"
.
Der Freitag
(in German). No. 35.
ISSN
0945-2095
. Retrieved
19 December
2023
.
- ^
Lee, Sidney
, ed. (1895).
"Falconet, Peter"
.
Dictionary of National Biography
. Vol. 44. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
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