Bronze Bather – Dalou

Description

Following the example of Allegrain and Falconet in the 18th century, Dalou continued to study the theme of the Bathers by adding a “naturalistic” touch, a movement of which he was one of the leaders at the end of the 19th century.
The workers and peasants that he would later study so passionately had not yet become the subject of his work. While in England, where he was in exile after the Commune because of his revolutionary opinions, he started to model intimate scenes of women rocking or breast-feeding their babies, reading, bathing, etc. These subjects soon attracted art lovers in England.
Dalou’s travels to Flanders and the masterpieces he discovered there led him to soften and develop his forms. This delicate study, the original plaster of which is in the Petit-Palais, appears to belong to this period.