François POMPON (1855 - 1933)
Water hen (terrace imitating the ground)
Model created in 1923
Bronze with brown patina
Published by Valsuani from 1923
Signed 'POMPON' on the left border of the terrace
Bears the founder's stamp 'C. Valsuani Cire Perdue" in the back left corner
Bears a number 10 probably inscribed later
Dim. H 26,2 x W x D. 12 cm S&C
Provenance: private collection in Lyon since the 1930s, by descent
Related works :
-François Pompon, Poule d'eau, plaster, dim. 26 x 28 x 12 cm, Musée de Grenoble, MG 2748
-François Pompon, Poule d'eau, bronze, lost wax casting, dim. 26,5 x 28 x 11,8 cm, signed, Paris, Musée d'Orsay, n°inv.RF.2378.
- François Pompon, Poule d'eau, bronze, lost wax casting, size 24 x 28 x 11, 8 cm, signed, Nancy, Musée des Beaux-Arts, n°inv. 65.2.114
-François Pompon, Poule d'eau, bronze, ca. 1921, bronze, signed, Copenhagen, Staten museum for Kunst, KMSr132
- François Pompon, Poule d'eau, 1923, lacquered bronze, signed and dedicated on the terrace "Affectueux hommage à Mme Claude Valsuani POMPON", founder's stamp on the terrace "C.VALSUANI CIRE PERDUE", dim. 25 x 29,20 x 12,30 cm, Artcurial sale of 06 June 2016.
Related literature:
-Catherine Chevillot, Liliane Colas, Anne Pingeot, François pompon 1855 - 1933, Paris, Gallimard /Electa - RMN, 1994, model listed under n°154 C, p.223 ;
-Ss dir. Bernadette de Boysson and Valérie de Raignac, Autour de Barye et de Pompon, Hommage au legs Cruse Guestier, catalog of the exhibition held at the Musée des Arts décoratifs, Bordeaux, February 8 - April 29, 2002, p.58 ;
- Ss dir . Emmanuelle Héran, Le Zoo d'Orsay, catalog of the exhibition held at La Piscine-Musée d'art et d'industrie André Diligent, Roubaix, 1 March -25 May 2008, pp.192 -193.
"One day René (Demeurisse) was intrigued to see tissue paper cones on a shelf in the studio, covering confused shapes. Pompon answered simply: these are small sculptures that I am having fun making. René asked to look at them and was surprised to see true masterpieces, these studies which were none other than the goose, the duck, the moorhen in all their beauty and purity of line. The written recollections of René Demeurisse's wife bear witness to this crucial moment, around 1919, when Pompon met the man who helped to extricate him from his patrician status and make him the true leader of 20th century animal sculpture.
From the 1880s onwards Pompon enjoyed creating animal subjects by working with extremely simplified forms. He particularly modeled small farmyard animals that he observed in the Normandy countryside where he had acquired a house near that of his friend René de Saint-Marceaux. He exhibited his first animal bronze at the 1892 Salon (Poulet, n°2992). The famous publisher Adrien Hébrard was interested in his series of domestic animals and presented the first Pompon exhibition in 1919, just after the Great War. The sculptor entrusted him with a series of fourteen animal models, including a water hen (H. 19 cm) which he published, according to their contract, in only three copies between 1921 and 1924.
The resounding success of the Polar Bear at the 1922 Salon led to a wider distribution of his work. In 1923, the Valsuani foundry launched a new edition of bronze proofs of the Water Hen, based on the same model used by Adrien Hébrard, but with a higher naturalist terrace (H. 26 cm) and a slightly modified right paw. This edition was a great success until the turn of 1930. Having quickly reached the twenty proofs fixed by the sculptor - numbered (or not always) and for the most part dedicated - the edition then continued without the number of proofs being known precisely (less than thirty). Our copy belongs, a priori, to this edition.
Around 1930/31, a new edition was widely distributed by the Valsuani house. It is based on a model still modified, with a terrace henceforth all smooth (H.27,5 cm). This edition, the most important of the three successive editions in number of copies, would have exceeded 200 copies, according to Pompon himself.
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