Wax and Terracotta
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Émile Deschamps, 1829
Wax on slate
13.3 x 12.1 cm
Collection Carol and Herbert DiamondCat. 7
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Seated Woman, ca. 1830s
Terracotta
19 x 15.5 cm
Collection Dr. and Mrs. Michael SchlossbergCat. 8
David had little patience for the eroticized mythological nudes that jostled for attention each year at the Paris Salon. Accordingly, this elegant terracotta sketch depicts a woman in modern dress, possibly interrupted in the act of reading. Yet this apparently everyday moment may also be an update of the centuries-old pictorial convention of seated muses. For David, terracotta sketches were important records of an artist’s first thoughts. He presented them only to close friends who he believed could appreciate their suggestive, unfinished qualities.
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The Abbé de Lamennais, 1831
Wax on slate
16.5 x 14 cm
Private collectionCat. 9
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Pierre-René Choudieu, 1832
Wax on slate
14 x 12.4 cm
Collection Dr. Stephen K. and Janie Woo ScherCat. 10
“I pursue always my gallery of great men,” wrote David in 1830–31. “One sees me, running with my little slate, as if I were going to meet immortality.” The city of Angers was well known for its local slate quarries, and David used the stone as a support for his wax models. In this portrait of a Republican politician and prosecutor, the deep blue-green slate provides a lively contrast to the vibrant red of the tinted wax. David’s interest in portraiture reflects the dramatic increase in popularity of that genre in the early nineteenth century. For David, one of the most prolific portraitists of his age, the depiction of the human face was “the great career to which modern art is called.”
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Christening Cup, 1835
Wood, wax, and graphite
18.9 cm high
Collection Pierre BergéCat. 11
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Model for the Philopoemen, 1837
Terracotta
31 x 10.5 x 10.3 cm
Inscribed in ink on base, à Victor Pavie
Collection Roberta J. M. Olson and Alexander B. V. JohnsonCat. 12