The Large Art Company | Bronze Sculptors and Artist Profiles

Antoine Louis Barye
Isidora Jules Bonheur
Marcel-Andre Bouraine
Demetre Chiparus
Clare Jeanne Roberte Colinet
Louis Justin Icart
Carl Kauba
Pierre Jules “PJ” Mene
Jules Moigniez
Fredrick Remington
Auguste Rodin
Charles Marion Russell
Max Turner
Emmanuel Villanis

Antoine Louis Barye (1796-1875) was born in Paris On September 24, 1796, as the son of a goldsmith he worked as an apprentice to a metal engraver until he was drafted into the military in 1812. Following the war he studied with the Classical sculptor Bosio. From 1818 to 1823 he attended The Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, winning a second prize in 1819. In 1832 he established his own studio. In 1848 he became director of plaster casting establishment in Louvre and in 1854 he was master of zoological drawing in the Musee d' Histore Naturelle where one of his pupils was Rodin. Barye was the classic case of an artist's struggle for recognition; his talent was too advanced to be appreciated by most until the late 1830's. He was the greatest animal sculptor of all time and is the father of the Animialier School.

Isidore Jules Bonheur (1827-1901) was one of a family of well known painters; he studied painting, moving on to sculpture in 1848. He exhibited until 1899, winning the coveted Gold Medal at the Universal Exhibition in Paris. Somewhat overshadowed by his older sister Rosa, Isidore nevertheless was highly accomplished. He completed a memorial statue to his sister in Fontainloleau during the last two years of his life. Bonheurs's studies ranged from farm animals to bears and tigers, to equestrian groups in a very natural and realistic quality. He was inspired possibly by his many visits to the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show.

Marcel-Andre Bouraine Born in Pontoise (Seine-et Oise), he studied under Jean-Alexndre-Joseph Falguiere (1881 - 1900), who had reintroduced and emphasized realism in nineteenth-century sculpture. Bouraine was captured in Germany during the First World War, and interned in Switzerland. In 1922, he exhibited at the Salon des Tuileries. The following year he began to exhibit at the Salon d'Autommne. He executed small-scale sculptures for several French firms, including Susse Freer, La Verrier, and Arthur Goldscheider, often exhibiting with the latter's La Stele and L'Evolution groups. In 1928 Gabriell Argy-rousseau (1885- 1953) commissioned a number of figurines from Bouraine, mostly female nudes, but also a fountain and an illuminated group, all of which were executed in colored, translucent pate de verre. He executed two major commissions for the 1937 Paris International Exhibition, a colored cement low relief, twelve square meters in size, for a fountain at the Crafts center and an earthenware statue representing ceramics for the Sevres Pavilion, 180 centimeters high and 160 centimeters wide.

Dimitri Chiparus (1888-1950) Born in Rumania Chiparus immigrated to Paris, were he studied under Antonin Mercier and Jean Boucher. He began to exhibit small sculptures, his very first showing at the salon of the societe des Artistes Francais in 1914 leading to an honorable mention that same year. Louis Comfort Tiffany was also awarded an honorable mention that same year. Chiparus was an extremely prolific artist, producing a wide variety of mainly small scale figures. These were executed generally either all in bronze or with bronze and ivory. His last recorded exhibit at the salon was in 1939.Though his feminine figures and dancers made his reputation; he also produced a vast array of sculptures of children. Some of his bronzes were cast at the Marcel Guillemard foundry in Paris. He was awarded a prize at the salon des Beaux-Arts, in which several chryselephantine sculptures exhibited.

Clare Jeanne Roberte Colinet Born in Brussels, she studied sculpture there with Jef Lambeaux (1852 - 1908) before moving to Paris. She first exhibited at the Salon of the Societe des Artistes Francais in 1913, and was awarded an Honourable Mention the following year, as were Chiparus and Tiffany. She became a naturalized Frenchwoman, and continued to exhibit at the Salon des Artistes Francais, where she was elected a full member in 1929, which she celebrated by exhibiting the plaster cast of a statue entitles Les reves sont des bulles da savon (Dreams are Soap Bubbles). She exhibited at the Salon de Independents in Paris from 1937 - 1940 and was a Member of the Union des Femmes peintres et sculpteurs (Union of Women Painters and Sculptures). She executed her compositions mainly for three editors, Edmond Etling, Arthur Goldscheider and Les Neveux de J Lehmann. She lived at Asnieres (Seine), at 59 rue du Chateau. Colinet's figures are frequently very dramatic in concept and catch the models in hieratic poses, in the midst of executing a particularly complicated set of dance steps, or else forming the climax of a Biblical or historical anecdote. The bronze in her figures is normally patinated, not cold painted, and sometimes jeweled. Her last recorded exhibition at the Salon was in 1945.

Louis Justin Icart was born September 12, 1888 in France. His inspiration for much of his work came from second wife, Fanny, and the international center of beauty and art, the city of Paris. During his forty year artistic career Icart delighted lovers of Art Deco, a fashion directed almost exclusively towards women on both sides of the Atlantic. Art Deco was a period of perfection of workmanship and this factor in Icart’s work related him to the period.

Carl Kauba was born in Vienna in 1865and died in 1922. Although He signed “Carl”, Kauba’s Birth certificate officially identifies him as “Karl” son of an Australian shoemaker. He never visited America himself but was inspired by the romantic stories of the German, Carl May and many photographers and illustrations which he had seen. He was also inspired by the possessions of a complete Western saddle and other Indian artifacts that an American friend from Ohio sent as gifts. In contrast to most artists, Kauba’s success as a businessman was equal to his artistic achievements. He worked in a studio in his home and personally directed the casting of his clay models in local foundries.

Pierre Jules Mene was born in Paris in 1810 and died there in 1871.Mene was the most successful and prolific animalier of his day. He was born into an apparently prosperous artisan family. Mene's father was a skilled metal tuner and was able to teach his son the basics of working a metal foundry and the principals of sculpture. He interpreted his own sketches into bronze casts by his own hand and rapidly established a reputation for himself. Mene won four medals at the salon and at major exhibitions, receiving the Cross of the Legion d'Honneur in 1861.He was influenced by the French painter Carle Vennet and the English painter Landseer. His bronzes inherited much of the warm, friendly style of romanticism but he soon developed his own style of naturalism. He became the most important and influenced animalier of his time.

Jules Moigniez (1835-1894) was of the French nationality. From 1859 to 1892 he displayed 30 animal groups in the salon were he made his debut. Most of his sculptures were of game birds and hunting dogs. Moigniez committed suicide after a long illness. After Moigniez's death his bronzes were cast by A. George. Most of them appeared at the 1862 Exposition in London, were the artist won a medal.

Fredrick Remington (1861-1909) Depicted the life of the cowboy during 1880's and 1890's probably better than any other artist in his time. He thought of himself as a true citizen of the American West. Born in Canton NY, Remington left college at the age of 19 looking for adventure in the West. Remington operated his own ranch in Kansas and in 1886, he gave it up as a failure and came back to the East. The experience served him well in his later career as an artist. "What success I have had," Remington had once told a news reporter "has been because I have a horseman's knowledge of a horse. No one can draw equestrian subjects unless he is an equestrian himself".

As an artist, Remington first made a name for himself a san illustrator and painter and began sculpting only 14 years before his death in 1909, "I was impelled to try my hand at sculpture by a mental desire to say something in the round as well as in flat. Sculpture is the most perfect expression of action. You can say it all in clay". The first Remington in clay was "Bronco Buster" which was completed in 1895.

Among his admirers were Theodore Roosevelt, who once said that "Remington portrayed a most characteristic and yet vanishing type of American life. The soldier, the cowboy, the rancher, the horse, the Indian and cattle of the plains will live in his pictures and his bronzes, I verily believe for all time." To read more about the history of Frederic Remington statues, click here

Rodin, Auguste (1840-1917). The French artist Auguste Rodin had a profound influence on 20th-century sculpture. His works are distinguished by their stunning strength and realism. Rodin refused to ignore the negative aspects of humanity, and his works confront distress and moral weakness as well as passion and beauty.

Francois-Auguste-Rene Rodin was born on Nov. 12, 1840, in Paris. At the age of 14 he entered the Petite Ecole, a school of decorative arts in Paris. He applied three times to study at the renowned Ecole des Beaux-Arts but was rejected each time. In 1858 he began to do decorative stonework in order to make his living. Four years later the death of his sister Marie so traumatized Rodin that he entered a sacred order.

The father superior of the order recognized Rodin's talents and encouraged him to pursue his art. In 1864 Rodin met a seamstress named Rose Beuret. She became his life companion and was the model for many of his works. That year Rodin submitted his Man with a Broken Nose to the Paris Salon. It was rejected but later accepted under the title Portrait of a Roman. Rodin traveled in 1875 to Italy, where the works of Michelangelo made a strong impression on him. The trip inspired his sculpture The Age of Bronze, which was exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1877. It caused a scandal because the critics could not believe that Rodin had not used a casting of a live model in creating so realistic a work.

The controversy brought Rodin more fame than praise might have. In 1880 he was commissioned to create a bronze door for the future Museum of Decorative Arts. Although the work was unfinished at the time of his death, it provided the basis for some of Rodin's most influential and powerful work. In 1884 he was commissioned to create a monument that became The Burghers of Calais. His statues St. John the Baptist Preaching, Eve, The Age of Bronze, and The Thinker are world famous. Rodin died on Nov. 17, 1917, and was buried at Meudon.

When Rodin was 76 years old he gave the French government the entire collection of his own works and other art objects he had acquired. They occupy the Hotel Biron in Paris as the Musee Rodin and are still placed as Rodin set them.

Charles Marion Russell was born on March 19, 1864 in Oakhill, Missouri, died in Great Falls, Montana in 1926. He was a self taught artist, drawing inspiration from his life experience as a cowboy. He specialized in western style life: cowboys, Indians, buffalo, bears, cougars and his favorite- horses. The viewer of Russell’s bronzes share in his feelings of delight and despair, his moments of high excitement and those of quite humor. The sculptor was blessed with an ability to see those critical details that give his works excitement of life. Some of his bronzes are more impressionistic than others. By 1914 he had established himself as a success, as a sculptor and painter.

Max Turner is a Southern California artist. I don't know when he was born, but he is in his 70's. His specialty if life-size figures including children and animals. He has made a career out of taking small sculptures and enlarging them to life-size. He is still working today although he does more supervising of younger sculptors than actually doing it himself.

Emmanuel Villanis was an Italian born sculptor and one of the most prolific sculptors of the late Victorian, early Noveau periods. His works are almost exclusively female subjects. His pieces are easily recognized by the artistic scrolling of the subjects name below her face. Also readily identifiable as Villanis are the perfect, ideally proportioned features of his women's faces he used a deep cut for the eyes - a technique that was in sharp contrast to other sculptors of the time who tried to reproduce the natural eyeball.