Vincenzo Gemito (1852-1929) - Lot 83

Lot 83
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Estimation :
30000 - 40000 EUR
Résultat : NC
Vincenzo Gemito (1852-1929) - Lot 83
Vincenzo Gemito (1852-1929) Portrait of Mathilde Duffaud Model created circa 1878-1879 Bronze with green patina Signed "GEMITO" on the back Bears the founder's stamp "CIRE PERDUE / A.A. HEBRARD". H. 47 cm, on a base in the imitation of an Ionic capital H. 19 cm A recent discovery among the Neapolitan sculptor's hitherto documented works is the portrait of Mathilde Duffaud, Gemito's mistress and muse. Le Vincezo met Mathilde in Naples in 1872. The wife of French antiquarian Duhamel, Mathilde was on holiday. Gémito painted her portrait and fell in love with her. The two lovers soon settled down together in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius, and a few years later Mathilde followed the sculptor when he left for Paris. In addition to the first terracotta bust in 1972, Gémito sculpted or drew his muse in a variety of attitudes throughout their romance, which lasted until Mathilde's premature death after several years of serious illness. In an important written communication dated January 30, 2025, Jean-Loup Champion, art historian and scientific director of the monographic exhibition, Gémito: Le sculpteur de l'âme napolitaine (Paris, Petit Palais, October 15, 2019 - January 26, 2020) dates this bust to the sculptor's stay in France, more precisely between 1877 and 1878. He notes, beyond the Parisian mark of the founder and dealer Adrien Hébrard, a similarity between Mathilde's hairstyle and that found in portraits drawn by Gémito in Paris at the same time. The fine portrait, dated 1877 and painted in the capital by the couple's friend Antonio Mancini, shows the sculptor's mistress in the same finery. Above all, Jean-Loup Champion points out that for this astonishing portrait, Gémito departs from the crude, uncompromising naturalism of Pescatore, which offended the critics when it was presented at the 1877 Salon. Mathilde poses more sensually, more languidly, more suggestively than in the elegant but conventional Neapolitan portrait of 1872. The sculptor's hand is broader and faster, and the brushstrokes are more sketchy, freer and more "Parisian".
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