WORKSHOP OF JEAN-ANTOINE HOUDON (VERSAILLES 1741 - 1828 PARIS)FRENCH, DATED 1778 | Benjamin Franklin

with red wax cachet d'atelier on the reverse

Harry Burke, Philadelphia

This is a beautiful bust that has had a clean break horizontally above his collar and through the chest and it has been professionally restored. There are some minor chips and losses which have also been professionally treated. Otherwise there are standard surface abrasions, including a small abrasion at the end of his nose. The bust was probably patinated at one stage (as was customary in the 18th and 19th centuries) and there are remains of a glaze and patination beneath the now cream- colored polychromy that has been applied to the surface. There is an internal crack seen only with blacklight on interior from the crown of head down to the nose area but the bust is completely stable overall. The right hand edge of the workshop seal (on reverse) is lacking. The bust has been treated well by conservators and is a strong example of this wonderful composition.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Benjamin Franklin’s was the first American portrait made by Jean-Antoine Houdon and became the best known image of this exceedingly popular and distinguished “sage and savant”. Franklin, a statesman, inventor, philosopher and scientist, resided in France during most of the American Revolution serving as minister to that country with the purpose of winning French support for the American cause of independence. In 1778, Houdon produced his first portrait bust of Franklin, the terracotta that is now preserved in the Louvre. Subsequently, two marbles were carved, one executed in 1778, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and one dated 1779, sold in these rooms in 1998 to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The precision of the expression in Houdon’s 1778 portrait, upon which the present plaster depends, personifies Franklin’s humor and wisdom. Both of Houdon’s busts of Franklin portray him in contemporary dress, lacking shoulders and with a rounded truncation.

Franklin became a celebrity upon his arrival in Paris and his status in French society grew with the unveiling of new portraits of him by painters and sculptors such as Greuze, Boilly, Caffieri and Duplessis. But it was Houdon’s portrait that hastened the great demand for Franklin’s image.

The present portrait dated 1778 exists in other plaster versions including one in the Schlossmuseum, Gotha; the Musée Fabre, Montpelier; the American Society of Arts and Sciences, Boston on loan to the Boston Athenaeum and four other plasters that were mentioned by William Temple Franklin in a letter of April 3, 1785 but are untraced (Poulet, op.cit., p. 249).

Houdon was received as a member of the Académie royale 1777. He found patrons in courts all over Europe including Germany, Russia, Poland and Sweden and established his reputation as the pre-eminent portrait sculptor of his time in Europe. Houdon had modelled the likenesses of other men of letters, European nobility of the Enlightenment and the most prominent Americans, culminating in the full-length statue of George Washington in Richmond, Virginia.

Houdon’s technical achievements, sense of spontaneity and psychological realism paired with an elegance and dignity of character, are most evident in the present bust. This portrait has become so much of the iconography of America and its sense of immediacy, highlighted by the extremely naturalistic rendering of the eyes and the parted lips, as if Franklin were in mid-sentence, bring this cherished statesman to life.

RELATED LITERATURE
Anne L. Poulet and Guillhem Scherf, Jean-Antoine Houdon, Sculptor of the Enlightenment, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2003, no. 43, pp. 246-250;
Jack Hinton, Melissa Meighan and Andrew Lins, Encountering Genius. Houdon's Portraits of Benjamin Franklin, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2011