Folie de Printemps

Price: R160,000

The tradition of monumental and commemorative bronze sculpture in the Neoclassical style was continued by artists such as James Pradier (French, 1790-1852) and Carlo Marochetti (1805-1867).

Likewise, the use of small bronze figures as decorative pieces and as ornamentation for clocks and furniture also continued. The demand for these kinds of pieces were growing, as industrialisation was enriching ever greater numbers of people in European society.

This upsurge in demand would secure the success of the great Parisian bronze foundries of the 19th Century: among them Maisons Beurdeley, Barbedienne, Moreau, Picard and Susse Freres.

Many of the bronze sculptures produced in these foundries were replicas of older bronze and marble sculptures, by masters such as Giambologna and Clodion. By making astonishingly accurate casts of these masterpieces, the foundries tapped into a vast luxury market.

One particularly popularly-collected bronze figurine in the 19th Century was the Marly Horses, originally completed in marble by Guillaume Coustou (1677-1746) for the Chateau de Marly, and considered a masterpiece of French Baroque sculpture.

In the later 19th Century, new sculptors rose to fame for their pieces made solely for the domestic market: these included Jules Moigniez (French, 1835-1894), known for his animalier sculptures, and Franz Xaver Bergmann (Austrian, 1861-1936), renowned for his Orientalist bronzes and cold-painted works.