Pierre Roche created the bust of Huysmans in 1898: a plaster copy was presented at the Salon in the same year. The bronze was completed two years later. Gifted to Huysmans, it was sent to the writer’s Ligugé residence in October 1900. Upon receiving it, Huysmans expressed his enthusiasm: “The wonderfully patinated bust has just been unwrapped; it has arrived in good condition, intact. You have found a subdued and sumptuous colour - very good indeed. It is like the garden, autumnal.”

Pierre Roche, more at ease with decorative creations, took little interest in the portrait genre, something he only undertook for close friends and family, and his portraits are therefore very rare. In this field, the bust of Huysmans is unquestionably his masterpiece. The portrait - extremely realistic if we compare it with known photographs of Huysmans around 1900 - is also highly sensitive and lifelike. The facial expression, at once thoughtful and animated, seems to capture a candid moment, as if in the course of a friendly conversation.

In addition to the bust’s qualities of expression, its qualities of execution are also worth emphasising. When he received the work in Ligugé, Huysmans greatly admired the colour of the patina. Pierre Roche, as a curious and inventive artist, indeed took a strong interest in the effects offered by the many nuances of patina.

This portrait of Huysmans is all the more precious since it is the only example produced in bronze (two plaster works are currently known to exist, one at the Musée Rodin and the other at the Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal). The quality of this bust of Huysmans was also recognised by contemporaries in the field of sculpture: it was reproduced several times in articles devoted to Pierre Roche in 1900-1910. Paul Vitry, art historian and curator at the Louvre Museum’s department of sculpture, thus referred to the sculptor’s “excellent portrait busts”, including this one of Huysmans.

C. C.-V.