HÉBERT, Emile

Honoré de Balzac

Honoré de Balzac

1877

terracotta

bust

Dimensions (HxWxD): 33 ⁷⁄₁₆ x 25 ⁹⁄₁₆ x 16 ¹⁵⁄₁₆ in.

Acc. No.: 2006.19

Credit Line: Purchase with funds from Irene and Howard Stein

Photo credit: courtesy High Museum of Art, Atlanta

© Artist : public domain

Atlanta, Georgia, High Museum of Art

www.high.org

Provenance

• Paris, Galerie Patrice Bellanger
• 2006, Purchase with funds from Irene and Howard Stein

Bibliography

• Museum's website, June 10, 2013

Exhibitions

• 2011 Atlanta
  Toulouse-Lautrec & Friends: The Irene and Howard Stein Collection, Atlanta, High Museum of Art, January 29-May 1, 2011, curated by David Brenneman, p. 134, cat. no. 69

Related works

• Plaster with terracotta slip bust at Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, acquired 2009.

Comment

• Museum's website, June 10, 2013:
  Hébert specialized in memorial sculpture and portraits of great men and maintained a successful career, exhibiting at the Salon many times until his death in 1893. Remarkable for its grand dimensions, this terracotta portrait pays homage to the immense prestige and physical presence of Honoré de Balzac. Hébert cleverly combined a monumental quality with a sense of the sitter’s intellectual agility—the sharp glance to the right and faint smile express the character of Balzac, an ironic observer of his contemporaries.