Circle of Germain Pilon (1535-1590), French, Paris, circa 1580 | Entourage de Germain Pilon (1535-1590), France, Paris, vers 1580

Jacques Petithory, Paris, until 1976;

Jean Rossignol (1908-1984), Paris;

his sale, Paris, Artcurial, 13 December 2005, lot 155;

private European collection

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Collection Jacques Petithory, Paris, jusqu’en 1976 ;

Collection Jean Rossignol (1908-1984), Paris ;

Sa vente, Paris, Artcurial, 13 décembre 2005, lot 155 ;

Collection privée européenne.

L. Camins, Renaissance and Baroque Bronzes from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection, San Francisco, The Fine Arts Museums, 1988, p. 124

This expressive sculpture depicts Saint John in a dynamic manner and looking upwards with convincing pathos, which indicates that he was originally part of a Crucifixion group. The present figure is a vibrant and elegant example of 16^th century French alabaster sculpture and demonstrates convincing stylistic similarities to the work of Germain Pilon. Born in Paris, Pilon trained in the workshop of his father, where he mastered various media including alabaster. Germain Pilon was one of the most celebrated French sculptors of the second half of the 16th century and became the chief sculptor after the exile of Jean Goujon in 1562. Two of his sons including Raphael Pilon (1559-90) and Germain Pilon the younger (b. 1571) also became sculptors, and his daughter Claude Pilon (b. 1564) married the painter Nicolas Leblond in 1583.

The present alabaster is mentioned in Renaissance and Baroque Bronzes from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection as a close stylistic variant to a bronze figure of Saint John (op. cit., L. Camins). They compare in their slender physique, elongated fingers, sunken cheeks, and nervous drapery with deep folds which is similarly arranged over his left shoulder with a larger drape at his right hip. Further parallels can be drawn to two alabaster angels included in Pilon’s funerary monument of Séguier in the Saint-André-des-Arts church. Their detailed clothing with profound folds and voluminous sleeves is noticeably alike. The attitude of the hands, one raised to his chest and the other holding the border of his garment, seems to derive from the angels’ posture. Furthermore, the treatment of the collar of one of the angels, which is worked with fine ruffled pleats, is near identical to the collar of Saint John.

Few documented independent works by Pilon exist, which challenges attributions to unknown works. Two alabaster figures of La Charité and Sainte Madeleine in the Musée du Louvre were previously ascribed to Pilon (op. cit., Bresc-Bautier, p. 55) but are now regarded as anonymous, French, second half 16^th century (inv. nos. RF 582 and RF 2671).

RELATED LITERATURE

G. Bresc-Bautier (ed.), Germain Pilon et les sculpteurs francais de la Renaissance, exh. cat. Musée du Louvre, Paris, 1900, p. 50, 55, 251; J. Babelon, Germain Pilon, Paris, 1927, pl. 49; M. Schwartz (ed.), European Sculpture from the Abbott Guggenheim Collection, New York, 2008, p.162-163