Marius Jean Antonin Mercié (October 30, 1845 – December 13, 1916, Paris), was a
FrenchThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
sculptorSculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
and
painterPainting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
.
Life
Mercié was born in
ToulouseToulouse is a city in the Haute-Garonne department in southwestern FranceIt lies on the banks of the River Garonne, 590 km away from Paris and half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea...
. He entered the École des Beaux Arts,
ParisParis is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, and studied under
Alexandre FalguièreJean Alexandre Joseph Falguière was a French sculptor and painter.He was born in Toulouse...
and
François JouffroyFrançois Jouffroy was a French sculptor.Jouffroy was born in Dijon, the son of a baker, and attended the local drawing school before being admitted to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1824. In 1832 he won the Prix de Rome...
, and in 1868 gained the Grand Prix de Rome at the age of 23. His first great popular successes were the
DavidDavid was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible and, according to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, an ancestor of Jesus Christ through both Saint Joseph and Mary...
and
Gloria Victis, which was shown and received the Medal of Honour of the
Paris SalonThe Salon , or rarely Paris Salon , beginning in 1725 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Between 1748–1890 it was the greatest annual or biannual art event in the Western world...
. The
bronzeBronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...
was subsequently placed in the
Square MontholonThe Square Montholon is a square in the IXe arrondissement of Paris, France.Construction of the 4571m² square began in 1862, costing 160,000 francs, at the time of building of Rue Lafayette and opened in 1863....
.
The bronze
David was one of his most popular works. The
BiblicalThe Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
hero is depicted
nakedNudity is the state of wearing no clothing. The wearing of clothing is exclusively a human characteristic. The amount of clothing worn depends on functional considerations and social considerations...
with the head of Goliath at his feet like Donatello's David, but with a
turbanIn English, Turban refers to several types of headwear popularly worn in the Middle East, North Africa, Punjab, Jamaica and Southwest Asia. A commonly used synonym is Pagri, the Indian word for turban.-Styles:...
ned head and sheathing his long sword. Numerous reproductions exist, most of which incorporate a
loinclothA loincloth is a one-piece male garment, sometimes kept in place by a belt, which covers the genitals and, at least partially, the buttocks.-History and types:Loincloths are being and have been worn:*in societies where no other clothing is needed or wanted...
that covers David's genitalia but not his buttocks. The lifesize original is in the
Musée d'OrsayThe Musée d'Orsay is a museum in Paris, France, on the left bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, an impressive Beaux-Arts railway station built between 1898 and 1900. The museum holds mainly French art dating from 1848 to 1915, including paintings, sculptures, furniture,...
.
Mercié was appointed Professor of Drawing and Sculpture at the École des Beaux Arts, and was elected a member of the
Académie françaiseL'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...
in 1891, after being awarded the biennial prize of the Institute of 800 in 1887. He was subsequently elected to grand officier of the
Légion d'HonneurThe Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
, and in 1913 became the president of the
Société des artistes françaisThe Société des Artistes Français is the association of French painters and sculptors established in 1881. Its annual exhibition is called the Salon....
.
Work
The Genius of the ArtsaRts, which stands for analog Real time synthesizer, is an audio framework that is no longer under development. It is best known for previously being used in KDE to simulate an analog synthesizer....
(1877), a
reliefRelief is a sculptural technique. The term relief is from the Latin verb levo, to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is thus to give the impression that the sculpted material has been raised above the background plane...
, is in the Tuileries, in substitution for
Antoine-Louis BaryeAntoine-Louis Barye was a French sculptor most famous for his work as an animalier, a sculptor of animals.-Biography:Born in Paris, Barye began his career as a goldsmith, like many sculptors of the Romantic Period...
's Napoleon III. A similar work for the tomb of
Jules MicheletJules Michelet was a French historian. He was born in Paris to a family with Huguenot traditions.-Early life:His father was a master printer, not very prosperous, and Jules assisted him in the actual work of the press...
(1879; designed with architect
Jean-Louis PascalJean-Louis Pascal was an academic French architect.- Life :Born in Paris, Pascal was taught at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts by Émile Gilbert and Charles-Auguste Questel...
) is in the
cemeteryA cemetery is a place in which dead bodies and cremated remains are buried. The term "cemetery" implies that the land is specifically designated as a burying ground. Cemeteries in the Western world are where the final ceremonies of death are observed...
of Père Lachaise, and in the same year Mercié produced the statue of
Arago with accompanying reliefs, now erected at
Perpignan-Sport:Perpignan is a rugby stronghold: their rugby union side, USA Perpignan, is a regular competitor in the Heineken Cup and seven times champion of the Top 14 , while their rugby league side plays in the engage Super League under the name Catalans Dragons.-Culture:Since 2004, every year in the...
.
In 1882 he repeated his great patriotic success of 1874 with a group
Quand Même!, replicas of which have been set up at
BelfortBelfort is a commune in the Territoire de Belfort department in Franche-Comté in northeastern France and is the prefecture of the department. It is located on the Savoureuse, on the strategically important natural route between the Rhine and the Rhône – the Belfort Gap or Burgundian Gate .-...
and in the garden of the Tuileries.
Le Souvenir (1885), a marble statue for the tomb of
Mme Charles FerryCharles Émile Joseph Léon Ferry was a French politician.Younger brother of Jules Ferry, Charles Ferry was born in Saint-Dié, in the département of Vosges...
, is one of his most beautiful works.
Regret, for the tomb of
Alexandre CabanelAlexandre Cabanel was a French painter.- Biography :Cabanel was born in Montpellier, Hérault. He painted historical, classical and religious subjects in the academic style. He was also well known as a portrait painter...
, was produced in 1892, along with
William TellWilliam Tell is a folk hero of Switzerland. His legend is recorded in a late 15th century Swiss chronicle....
, now at
LausanneLausanne is a city in Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland, and is the capital of the canton of Vaud. The seat of the district of Lausanne, the city is situated on the shores of Lake Geneva . It faces the French town of Évian-les-Bains, with the Jura mountains to its north-west...
.
Mercié also designed the monuments to
Jean-Louis-Ernest MeissonierJean-Louis Ernest Meissonier was a French Classicist painter and sculptor famous for his depictions of Napoleon, his armies and military themes. He documented sieges and manoeuvres and was the teacher of Édouard Detaille.-Biography:Ernest Meissonier was born at Lyon...
(1895), erected in the Jardin de l'Infante in the
LouvreThe Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
, and
Louis FaidherbeLouis Léon César Faidherbe was a French general and colonial administrator. He created the Senegalese Tirailleurs when he was governor of Senegal.- Background :...
(1896) at
LilleLille is a city in northern France . It is the principal city of the Lille Métropole, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the country behind those of Paris, Lyon and Marseille. Lille is situated on the Deûle River, near France's border with Belgium...
, a statue of
Adolphe ThiersMarie Joseph Louis Adolphe Thiers was a French politician and historian. was a prime minister under King Louis-Philippe of France. Following the overthrow of the Second Empire he again came to prominence as the French leader who suppressed the revolutionary Paris Commune of 1871...
set up at St Germain-en-Laye, the monument to
Paul BaudryPaul-Jacques-Aimé Baudry was a French painter.-Biography:He studied under Michel Martin Drolling and carried off the Prix de Rome in 1850 by his picture of Zenobia found on the banks of the Araxes...
at Père Lachaise, and that of Louis-Philippe and Queen Amélie for their tomb at
DreuxDreux is a commune in the Eure-et-Loir department in northern France.-History:Dreux was known in ancient times as Durocassium, the capital of the Durocasses Celtic tribe. Despite the legend, its name was not related with Druids. The Romans established here a fortified camp known as Castrum...
. His stone group of
JusticeJustice is a concept of moral rightness based on ethics, rationality, law, natural law, religion, or equity, along with the punishment of the breach of said ethics; justice is the act of being just and/or fair.-Concept of justice:...
is at the
Hôtel de VilleThe Hôtel de Ville |City Hall]]) in :Paris, France, is the building housing the City of Paris's administration. Standing on the place de l'Hôtel de Ville in the city's IVe arrondissement, it has been the location of the municipality of Paris since 1357...
, Paris.
Numerous other statues, portrait busts, and medallions came from the sculptor's hand, which gained him a medal of honor at the
Paris ExhibitionThe third Paris World's Fair, called an Exposition Universelle in French, was held from 1 May through to 10 November 1878. It celebrated the recovery of France after the 1870 Franco-Prussian War.-Construction:...
(1878) and the grand prix at that of 1889. Among the paintings exhibited by the artist are a Venus, to which was awarded a medal in 1883,
Leda- Places :* Leda , tributary of the Ems in Germany* Leda, Western Australia, a suburb of Perth, Western Australia* Leda, Burkina Faso- Astronomy :* Leda , a moon of Jupiter* 38 Leda, an asteroid...
(1884), and
Michelangelo studying AnatomyAnatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...
(1885), his most dramatic work in this medium.
Mercié is known in the America primarily for three monuments: the 1890
Robert E. LeeRobert Edward Lee was a career military officer who is best known for having commanded the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia in the American Civil War....
equestrianAn equestrian statue is a statue of a rider mounted on a horse, from the Latin "eques", meaning "knight", deriving from "equus", meaning "horse". A statue of a riderless horse is strictly an "equine statue"...
bronze on
Monument AvenueMonument Avenue, in Richmond, Virginia, is a premier example of the Grand American Avenue city planning style. The first monument, a statue of Robert E. Lee was erected in 1890. Between 1900 and 1925, Monument Avenue exploded with architecturally significant houses, churches and apartment buildings...
in
Richmond, VirginiaRichmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
; his 1891 collaboration with former teacher
Alexandre FalguièreJean Alexandre Joseph Falguière was a French sculptor and painter.He was born in Toulouse...
on the statue of the Marquis de Lafayette in the District of Columbia, and for the 1911
Francis Scott KeyFrancis Scott Key was an American lawyer, author, and amateur poet, from Georgetown, who wrote the lyrics to the United States' national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner".-Life:...
Monument, Baltimore, Maryland.
External links