Théophile François Marcel Bra (23 June 1797,

Douai Douai (, , ,; pcd, Doï; nl, Dowaai; formerly spelled Douay or Doway in English) is a city in the Nord département in northern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department. Located on the river Scarpe some from Lille and from Arras, D ...

- 1863) was a French Romantic sculptor and exact contemporary of

Eugène Delacroix Ferdinand Victor Eugène Delacroix ( , ; 26 April 1798 – 13 August 1863) was a French Romantic artist regarded from the outset of his career as the leader of the French Romantic school.Noon, Patrick, et al., ''Crossing the Channel: Britis ...

. He was deeply involved in the Romantic era through his uncompromising personality and complex spirituality. His fantastical inspiration evokes the universes inhabited by

Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 174616 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and ...

William Blake William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his life, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual art of the Romantic Age. ...

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...

- he was at one and the same time a Bonapartist and an anglophile, a passionate Christian disciple of

Swedenborg Emanuel Swedenborg (, ; born Emanuel Swedberg; 29 March 1772) was a Swedish pluralistic-Christian theologian, scientist, philosopher and mystic. He became best known for his book on the afterlife, ''Heaven and Hell'' (1758). Swedenborg had a ...

and an admirer of Judaism, Hinduism and Buddhism.

Life

From a family that had been sculptors for four generations, Bra studied art in Paris. He won second prize in the

Prix de Rome The Prix de Rome () or Grand Prix de Rome was a French scholarship for arts students, initially for painters and sculptors, that was established in 1663 during the reign of Louis XIV of France. Winners were awarded a bursary that allowed them t ...

in 1818 and was made a

Freemason Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...

in 1824 in Douai's "la Parfaite union" lodge. He also belonged to lodges in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

Lille Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...

and

between 1825 and 1840. He left his birthplace of Douai 100 boxes and albums of torrential writings, holding 5,000 drawings associated with the texts. Many sheets from this bequest, now kept in Douai's City Library, have been the subject of exhibitions in the United States and France, such as at Balzac's house, the Musée de la Chartreuse at Douai and the

Musée de la vie romantique The Musée de la Vie romantique (Museum of Romantic Life, or ''Museum of the Romantics'') stands at the foot of Montmartre hill in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, 16 rue Chaptal, Paris, France in an 1830 ''hôtel particulier'' facing two twin-stu ...

in Paris.

Works

His marble and plaster sculptures are numerous, in Douai's Musée de la Chartreuse, Paris churches and the museums at Versailles,

and

Valenciennes Valenciennes (, also , , ; nl, label=also Dutch, Valencijn; pcd, Valincyinnes or ; la, Valentianae) is a commune in the Nord department, Hauts-de-France, France. It lies on the Scheldt () river. Although the city and region experienced a s ...

, many of them being commissions under the

Bourbon Restoration Bourbon Restoration may refer to: France under the House of Bourbon: * Bourbon Restoration in France (1814, after the French revolution and Napoleonic era, until 1830; interrupted by the Hundred Days in 1815) Spain under the Spanish Bourbons: * ...

and

July Monarchy The July Monarchy (french: Monarchie de Juillet), officially the Kingdom of France (french: Royaume de France), was a liberal constitutional monarchy in France under , starting on 26 July 1830, with the July Revolution of 1830, and ending 23 F ...

. Others are to be seen on the

Église de la Madeleine , other name = , native_name = , native_name_lang = French , image = Madeleine Paris.jpg , landscape = , imagesize = , caption = , imagelink ...

Palais du Louvre The Louvre Palace (french: link=no, Palais du Louvre, ), often referred to simply as the Louvre, is an iconic French palace located on the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, occupying a vast expanse of land between the Tuileries Gardens and the ...

and the

Arc de Triomphe The Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile (, , ; ) is one of the most famous monuments in Paris, France, standing at the western end of the Champs-Élysées at the centre of Place Charles de Gaulle, formerly named Place de l'Étoile—the ''étoile'' ...

. *''Allegory of the besieged city of Lille'', on the

Column of the Goddess The Column of the Goddess is the popular name given by the citizens of Lille (France) to the Memorial of the Siege of 1792. The memorial is still in the center of the ''Grand′ Place'' (central square) of Lille, and has been surrounded by a founta ...

in Lille *''Christ on the cross'' and the ''Virgin and Child'', at the église Sainte-Catherine in Lille * Pediment of the

Hôpital-Général de Douai The Hôpital-Général de Douai was set up in 1752 in the French city of Douai Douai (, , ,; pcd, Doï; nl, Dowaai; formerly spelled Douay or Doway in English) is a city in the Nord département in northern France. It is a sub-prefecture o ...

* Bust of

Adolphe Édouard Casimir Joseph Mortier ''Adolphe'' is a classic French novel by Benjamin Constant, first published in 1816. It tells the story of an alienated young man, Adolphe, who falls in love with an older woman, Ellénore, the Polish mistress of the Comte de P***. Their illicit ...

Galerie des Batailles The Galerie des Batailles (; en, "Gallery of Battles") is a gallery occupying the first floor of the Aile du Midi of the Palace of Versailles, joining onto the ''grand'' and ''petit appartement de la reine''. long and wide, it is an epigone ...

at the

Château de Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 1995 has been managed, u ...

* Bust of Mme Mention, née Emilie Michel, bronze,

, Paris. * Statue of an androgynous angel,

Musée de la Chartreuse de Douai The Musée de la Chartreuse is an art museum in a former Carthusian monastery in Douai, France. It is the 'musée des Beaux-Arts' for the city. Building Built by Jacques d'Abancourt in brick and stone in the Renaissance style, on the site of ...

, which inspired Balzac to create the character of conte Séraphita in one of his 1835 ''Études philosophiques'' in ''

La Comédie humaine LA most frequently refers to Los Angeles, the second largest city in the United States. La, LA, or L.A. may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * La (musical note), or A, the sixth note * "L.A.", a song by Elliott Smith on ''Figure ...

''. * Bronze statue of

François Broussais François () is a French masculine given name and surname, equivalent to the English name Francis. People with the given name * Francis I of France, King of France (), known as "the Father and Restorer of Letters" * Francis II of France, Kin ...

, 1840, second courtyard of the Military Hospital at

Val-de-Grâce The (' or ') was a military hospital located at in the 5th arrondissement of Paris, France. It was closed as a hospital in 2016. History The church of the was built by order of Queen Anne of Austria, wife of Louis XIII. After the birth of h ...

. * One of the bas-reliefs on the base of the

Column of the Grande Armée The Column of the Grande Armée ( French - ''Colonne de la grande Armée'' or ''Colonne Napoléone'') is a 53 metre high Corinthian order triumphal column (modelled on Trajan's Column and other triumphal columns in Rome) on the Rue Napoleon in Wimi ...

, Wimille - 1840

Publications

* ''The Drawing speaks'' : Théophile Bra : Works 1826-1855'', Exhibition Catalogue, The Menil Collection, Houston, 1999, with contributions by

Jacques de Caso Jacques de Caso (born September 28, 1928) is a French-born American historian who specializes in the literature and history of pre-modern art in Europe, principally late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century French and German neo-classicism and Romanti ...

Hubert Damisch Hubert Damisch (28 April 1928 – 14 December 2017), was a French philosopher specialised in aesthetics and art history, and professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris from 1975 until 1996. Damisch studied at ...

, André Bigotte. * Théophile Bra, ''L'Evangile rouge'', edited by Jacques de Caso, Paris, Gallimard, 2000. * ''Sang d'encre - Théophile Bra, un illuminé romantique'', Musée de la Vie romantique, Paris, 2007. Contributions by Jacques de Caso, Hubert Damisch, Pierre-Jacques Lamblin, Daniel Marchesseau, with Françoise Baligand, André Bigotte, Marie-Claude Sabouret. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bra 1797 births 1863 deaths 19th-century French sculptors French male sculptors People from Douai French Freemasons 19th-century French male artists