3 - PAUL ALBERT BARTHOLOMÉ (Thiverval, 1848 – Paris, 1928).

PAUL ALBERT BARTHOLOMÉ (Thiverval, 1848 – Paris, 1928). “Young Girl Weeping Against a Wall.” Study for the Monument to the Dead at Père-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. Plaster. Measurements: 41 x 48 x 18 cm. Exhibitions: “20th-Century European Sculpture,” European Museum of Modern Art (MEAM), Barcelona, 2014. Paul-Albert Bartholomé was a prominent painter and sculptor, internationally renowned for his profound contribution to funerary art and to Symbolist and Art Nouveau sculpture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Trained as a painter, upon the death of his wife in 1886 and on the advice of his friend Degas, he turned to sculpture as a self-taught artist as a means of overcoming this loss. This shaped the melancholic character of his work, notably his “Monument to the Dead” at the Père-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, on which he worked for six years. Unveiled in 1899, it is immediately recognized as the work we are now offering for sale. His works are characterized by their emotional depth, conveyed through simple and refined forms that reveal the influence of his friend Puvis de Chavannes. Also noteworthy is his “Weeping Girl,” inspired by Rondín’s “Dadaine.”