Gravure du Monde illustré du 18 mars 1876Famous animal sculptor, Emmanuel Frémiet, nephew and pupil of François Rude, also excelled in the field of monumental statuary. Under the Third Republic, he thus obtained important public commissions, including the equestrian statue in gilded bronze of Joan of Arc, erected in 1874 on Place de Rivoli in Paris (now Place des Pyramides), close to the spot where she was injured. A year after its completion, Frémiet presented this effigy at the Salon of 1875, whose pose recalls praying figures of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

The choice of subject reflects the glorification of the great figures of national history during the second half of the 19th century, in particular Joan of Arc, who underwent a revival in popularity at the time of the war in 1870. A parallel was then being drawn between the situation of France in 1429, invaded by the English army but about to reconquer its territory, and that of the country in 1870, occupied by the Prussians but heroically resisting the invader.

Jeanne d'Arc, par Frémiet. Paris, place des Pyramides.This recently restored work allows us to appreciate the quality of the artist’s style, which pays constant attention to the respect for proportions and for archaeological precision of detail. The statue on Place des Pyramides had been met by a chorus of criticism due to the stiffness and coldness of its military representation, in an era when Joan of Arc was associated with the feminine virtues of grace, beauty and purity. Consequently, Frémiet strives here to feminise her subject, as shown by the softness of the contours under the armour, the kneeling pose, arching slightly backwards, and the long, loose hair escaping from the veil which flows from her helmet.

Despite its enthusiastic reception, this monumental plaster model, created as a funerary statue, did not find a purchaser at the Salon. It was therefore never cast in full size, but in reduced dimensions for its edition in bronze and in Sèvres biscuit porcelain.

H. D.

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