Lot 22: After Pierre Le Gros (1629-1714) A pair of French 18th century bronze figures of Aesop and Diogenes

Diogenes is represented with his lantern and the hunch-backed Aesop with a cockerel, dark brown patina, 16.5cm high (6" high.). (2)

This interesting pair of statuettes represents two out of a series of ten philosophers, of which historically documented examples are to be found in the museums of Budapest, Dresden and Stockholm.

The statuette of Aesop corresponds perfectly with a life-size lead statue (originally painted or gilded and now in the Versailles Museum) that - opposite a similar figure of Cupid - used to welcome elegant visitors to the Labyrinth in the gardens of Louis XIV's palace at Versailles (Inside the maze were lead sculptures of animals enacting his 39 Fables). This is documented to the sculptor Pierre Legros the Elder in 1672, and so it is likely that he produced the small model for the statuette, as well as for its several companions, which were then produced as a series in some commercial bronze foundry in Paris.



Literature:

- L.O. Larsson, European Bronzes 1450-1700, Swedish Natioanl Art Museums, Stockholm, 1992, pp. 46-47
- E. Szomodis-Eszlary, Trois petits bronzes de l'atelier de Pierre Legros I, Bulletin du Musée Hongrios des Beaux-Arts, 1973, pp. 41-48
- F. Souchal, French Sculptors of the 17th and 18th centuries. The reign of Louis XIV, vol.II, Oxford, 1981, p.251, no. 16
- Exhibition catalogue: Sechs Sammler stellen aus, Hambourg, Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe, 1966, nos. 89 et 90