Circle of Pradier 19th Century Bronze Seated Lady Reading

Circle of Jean Jacques (James) Pradier (1790-1852), a fine French romantic brown-patinated bronze of a lady reading while seated on a chair with hoofed legs and leopard mask knees. Unsigned. This bronze is very finely cast and chiseled. We have searched all our reference books and the internet but could not find another example of this work. It is constructed with 6 fastenings (4 screws, 2 bolts), which is unusual and generally only found on master models. “When the production involves a very large number of copies, the plaster is replaced by a “master model” in bronze specially made for this process. This master model, meticulously chiseled to transmit the maximum finesse to each reproduction, is sometimes made with screwed detachable pieces to facilitate the manufacture of the mould.” (Kjellbeg, Bronzes of the 19th Century, Schiffer 1994:14). 3 of the screws fix three of the legs of the chair to the seat. It would be unnecessary to fix them separately for production casting, so we speculate that this may be a master model that never went into production. We have ascribed this to the circle of Jean Jacques Pradier. It could have been ascribed to the circle of Mathurin Moreau (1822-1912), who also made similar bronzes, but as Pradier’s “Sappho” (1852) also has her seated on a hoof-footed chair, we thought it more likely his.