Napoleon I, Emperor of France (1769-1821)
French School
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
c. 1820 - 1880
Materials
Bronze
Measurements
210 x 70 mm
Place of origin
France
Order this imageCollection
The Argory, County Armagh
NT 564337
Summary
Sculpture, bronze; statuette of Napoleon I, Emperor of France (1769-1821); French; c. 1820-1880. A small statue depicting Napoleon Bonaparte in military uniform and his characteristic bicorn hat. One of innumerable small images made to commemorate the Emperor of the French, after his defeat and exile to Saint Helena, and his early death there.
Full description
A bronze statuette depicting Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821), Napoleon I, Emperor of the French. He is shown wearing his characteristic marshal’s uniform and his bicorne or bicorn (two-cornered) hat, his arms folded, his expression pensive. On his left breast is a crude rendition of the star of the Légion d’Honneur. On an integral rectangular bronze base, fixed by a screw to a larger rectangular bronze socle. The statuette is a late version of a model that seems to have first been produced around the time of Napoleon Bonaparte’s first exile, to the Tuscan island of Elba, but then became even more meaningful for the former Emperor's many supporters and admirers, after his defeat at Waterloo and exile to the British Atlantic island of Saint Helena, where he would die in 1821. With its pose showing the Emperor with his arms folded, eyes fixed on the far distance, the former ruler is depicted as if in exile, standing on a shore and gazing across thr sea towards Europe, ruminating on his past glories. An early example of the figure is the one in the Wallace Collection (Inv. S230; Mann 1981, p. 84),which seems to have been made around the time of Napoleon's first exile on Elba, as it has on the socle a relief of a fallen figure of fortune, inscribed ‘ISLE D’ELBE’. In this figure, the uniform is more carefully depicted, Napoleon wears his sword and is leaning against a pedestal covered with maps of Europe. The Argory statuette is a much simpler figure, of a type that was made in large numbers throughout the nineteenth century. Among the many later sculptors who manufactured these figures was Emile-Coriolan-Hippolyte Guillemin (1841-1907), who made a version of the Wallace Collection figure, at Felbrigg (NT 1399590). There is a slightly different model, produced by the Susse Frères foundry, at Greys Court (NT 195757). Jeremy Warren September 2022
Provenance
Walter McGeough Bond (1908-86), by whom given to the National Trust in 1979.
Makers and roles
French School, sculptor Unknown, sculptor