Pierre-Jules Mêne (; 25 March 1810 – 20 May 1879) was a French sculptor and ''

animalier An animalier (, ) is an artist, mainly from the 19th century, who specializes in, or is known for, skill in the realistic portrayal of animals. "Animal painter" is the more general term for earlier artists. Although the work may be in any genre ...

''. He is considered one of the pioneers of animal sculpture in the nineteenth century.

Early life

Mêne was born on 25 March 1810 in Paris, France. As a teenager he worked for his father, a metal turner. By 1837 he was casting his bronze sculptures in his own

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals pr ...

.Mackay, James, The Animaliers, E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc, 1973

Career

Mêne produced a number of animal sculptures, mainly of domestic animals including horses,

cows Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are called co ...

and bulls, sheep and goats which were in vogue during the Second Empire. He was one of a school of French ''animalières'' which also included

Rosa Bonheur Rosa Bonheur (born Marie-Rosalie Bonheur; 16 March 1822 – 25 May 1899) was a French artist known best as a painter of animals (animalière). She also made sculptures in a Realism (arts), realist style. Her paintings include ''Ploughing in the N ...

, Paul-Edouard Delabrierre, Pierre Louis Rouillard, Antoine-Louis Barye, his son

Alfred Alfred may refer to: Arts and entertainment *''Alfred J. Kwak'', Dutch-German-Japanese anime television series * ''Alfred'' (Arne opera), a 1740 masque by Thomas Arne * ''Alfred'' (Dvořák), an 1870 opera by Antonín Dvořák *"Alfred (Interlu ...

, son-in-law Auguste Caïn and François Pompon. His work was first shown in London by

Ernest Gambart Jean Joseph Ernest Theodore Gambart (12 October 1814 – 12 April 1902) was a Belgian-born Anglo-French art publisher and dealer who dominated the London art world in the middle of the nineteenth century. Life and career Gambart was born in Kor ...

in 1849. Mêne specialized in small

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...

figures which explains why none of his works exist as public

statuary A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to life-size. A sculpture ...

. His work was a popular success with the

bourgeois The bourgeoisie ( , ) are a class of business owners, merchants and wealthy people, in general, which emerged in the Late Middle Ages, originally as a "middle class" between the peasantry and Aristocracy (class), aristocracy. They are tradition ...

class and many editions of each sculpture were made, often to decorate private homes. The quality of these works is high, comparable to Barye's. Mêne enjoyed a longer period of success and celebrity than his contemporaries. He is considered to have been ''the''

lost-wax casting Lost-wax castingalso called investment casting, precision casting, or ''cire perdue'' (; borrowed from French)is the process by which a duplicate sculpture (often a metal, such as silver, gold, brass, or bronze) is cast from an original scul ...

expert of his time. The lost-wax casting method is sometimes referred to as the ''cire perdue'' method.

Copies, forgeries and reproductions

Because Mêne was so prolific and because so many editions of his works were made, his work is sometimes undervalued in the current market, and forgeries and reproductions of his works abound. However, original pieces cast during his lifetime continue to bring good prices at auction.

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n foundries are known to have copied Mêne's work. These castings can be recognized by the appearance of a small plaque, inscribed in

Cyrillic The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Ea ...

, most often found on the underside of the base of the sculpture. After Mène's death in 1879, the Susse Freres foundry acquired the rights to reproduce his models and produced posthumous proofs marked "Susse foundeur éditeur, Paris".

Death and legacy

Mêne died on 20 May 1879 in Paris, France. He is remembered as one of the finest, and certainly the most prolific, animalier sculptors of all time.

Notes

There are no known photographs or portraits of Mêne.

Gallery

Mene-1.jpg, Miniature bronze of horses by Mêne, c. 1850 Mene-6.jpg, P. J. Mêne signature Mene-5.jpg, Underside of an antique bronze by Mêne, c. 1850. Note the hand-cut bronze square nuts that were used during the mid-to-late 19th century.

Bibliography

*''

Catalogue raisonné A (or critical catalogue) is an annotated listing of the works of an artist or group of artists and can contain all works or a selection of works categorised by different parameters such as medium or period. A ''catalogue raisonné'' is normal ...

of Pierre-Jules Mêne'' by Michel Poletti and Alain Richarme (Paris, 1998). Catalogues 240 models with a history of editions from 1838 to 1933; biography; context of life and work in Second Empire Paris (in French).

References

External links

Bronze sculpture by Pierre Jules Mene
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mene, Pierre Jules 1810 births 1879 deaths 19th-century French sculptors French male sculptors 19th-century French male artists