{sculpture} – Page 75 – { feuilleton }

The Maison Lavirotte

More Art Nouveau and more Paris…. I can’t believe I missed this place when I was in Paris for a week, staying just a few streets away. The building is at 29 Avenue Rapp in the 7th arrondissement and I crossed that street several times when walking to the Champs de Mars and the Eiffel Tower.

The architect was Jules Lavirotte (1864–1929) and the building was named after him following its construction in 1901. His other works aren’t as excessively florid as this, nor do they display the Nouveau elegance of contemporaries such as Hector Guimard, so this façade may owe more to the capitulations of fashion than innate style. The attractively unclad figures on the pediment cock their hips at passers-by in a provocative manner that would never be allowed in British architecture of the period, and the door has some great details with stylised peacocks between the windows and a huge brass lizard for the handle.

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The art of Ying-Yueh Chuang

Plant creature 1 (2001).

Ying-Yueh Chuang’s ceramic sculptures are based on plant and animal forms, especially sea life. I haven’t seen any mention of her being inspired by Haeckel’s Art Forms in Nature but many of her creations certainly resemble the plants and animals in Haeckel’s illustrations.

It blooms on the day 1 (2004).

Via Fabulon.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of Jennifer Maestre
• Kirsten Hassenfeld’s paper sculptures
• Darwin Day
• The glass menagerie

The Divine Sarah

Sarah Bernhardt by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1895).

You can’t be a fin de siècle fetishist and not develop a fascination with actress Sarah Bernhardt, a woman who was muse to many of the era’s finest artists, most notably Alphonse Mucha, who she employed as her official designer. Mucha’s marvellous posters are endlessly popular, of course; less well-known is the sculpture by academic painter and Orientalist Jean-Léon Gérôme, a rare three-dimensional work inspired by the actress.

Inkwell by Sarah Bernhardt (1880).

Even less well-known is Ms Bernhardt’s own design for a curious bat-winged inkwell. I’ve read of her having created other sculptural works but so far this is the only one I’ve seen a picture of. With something as decadent as this you’d really have to use peacock quills for pens, wouldn’t you?

Bracelet by Alphonse Mucha & Georges Fouquet (1899).

And in a similar sinister vein to the inkwell there’s this serpentine bracelet and ring, a superb one-off, designed by Mucha and crafted by the jeweller Fouquet. After seeing works such as this and the Lalique dragonfly (which Ms Bernhardt once wore), most other jewellery seems timid and unadventurous in comparison.

Update: Added another photo of the inkwell.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of Philippe Wolfers, 1858–1929
• Lalique’s dragonflies
• Lucien Gaillard
• Smoke
• The Masks of Medusa

Narcissus

Narcissus by Paul Dubois (1866).

Via a Flickr page of sculpture photography.

The art of Philippe Wolfers, 1858–1929

Maléficia (1905).

Much of the jewellery and sculpture produced by Phillipe Wolfers demonstrates the tendency of Art Nouveau and decorative Symbolism to evolve from Decadence to full-blown Gothic. The sinister recurs in Wolfers’ creations whether in the form of baleful females such as Malèficia and his Medusa pendant, or in the shape of bats, insects and the ubiquitous fin de siècle serpent. There’s more Wolfers on the web than there was a couple of years ago but still too little; I scanned Malèficia from a book and swiped the bat ~~brooch~~ belt buckle (also a book scan) from Beautiful Century.

Large dragonfly (1903–04).

Le Jour et la Nuit (1897).

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Lalique’s dragonflies
• Lucien Gaillard
• The Masks of Medusa