Antoine-Louis Barye

Overall the condition of the bronze is excellent with some minor wear and dirt to the patina consistent with age. There is an area of greening on the inside of the bronze at the front. There is some wear to the lacquer on the edges of the wooden base.
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Tigre Dévorant un gavial launched Barye's career in 1831 when he exhibited the original plaster at the Paris Salon. Critic Etienne-Jean Delecluze described the plaster as 'the strongest and most significant work of the entire Salon', while Théophile Gautier commented, 'what energy, what ferocity, what a thrill of satisfied lust for killing shows in the flattened ears, the savage gleaming eyes, the curved nervous back, the clutching paws, the rocking haunches, and the writhing tail of the tiger, and how the poor scaly monster doubles in agony under those cutting teeth and jaws'.

The model was not only Barye's first Salon masterpiece but also proved to be a seminal sculpture for the emerging animalier genre. The plaster brought upon the movement both public attention and credibility, as critics applauded the outstanding excellence of the work's anatomy, technique and detail.

Another bronze version of this model is in the permanent collection of the Musée du Louvre (inv. no. OA5754) and another in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (inv. no. 10.108.2).

RELATED LITERATURE
M. Poletti and A. Richarme, Barye. Catalogue raisonné des sculptures, Paris, 2000, p. 205, no. A 74 (2); S. Pivar, The Barye bronzes. A catalogue raisonné, Woodbridge, 1990, p. 158, pl. 61; P. Fusco and H.W. Janson (eds.), The Romantics to Rodin, exh. cat. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 1980, p. 126-8, no. 16