The Sea - Raoul LARCHE (1860-1912)

A rare and exceptional pewter table 3 pieces center
Made up of a centering group cast in pewter and its ensuite pair of sculptures
cast by SIOT-DECAUVILLE

France
circa 1894
centerpiece : Height 75 cm / Length 80 cm / Depth 30 cm
pair of sculptures : Height 41 cm

A similar model of these 3 pieces is now exposed at the Musée d'Orsay (inv. 0A0 214, 215 et 216), bought by the French State at the Salon de la Société des Artistes Français in 1894 for the Musée du Luxembourg.

A similar model is reproduced in "Etains 1900 – 200 sculpteurs de la Belle Epoque", P. Dahnan, Les Editions de l'Amateur, 2000, page 229,
and in "Notes sur l'étain", E. Molinier, Art et Décoration, Revue mensuelle d'art moderne, juill.-déc. 1897, tome II, page 84.

Biography :
François-Raoul Larche, known as Raoul Larche (1860-1912) was the son of Guillaume Larche, an ornamental sculptor and cabinetmaker. After passing through the National School of Decorative Arts, he was admitted to the National School of Fine Arts of Paris where he was the student of François Jouffroy, Auguste Dumont, Alexandre Falguière, Jean-Léon Gérôme and Eugène Delaplanche. Larche started his career at the Salon des artistes français in 1884 and exhibited there very regularly until 1911. In 1886, he won the second prize of Rome. That year, the subject of the contest was "Tobie removing the fish from the water". He received a third class medal in 1890, a first class medal in 1893, a gold medal at the 1900 World's Fair and a medal of honor in 1910.

Raoul Larche is one of the many artists to have been influenced by the American dancer Loïe Fuller: the lamp made in 1901 and inspired by the dancer, ranked Larche among the sculptors who broke with the academic art and assured him a great reputation. This is how he created many bronze and tin art objects (lamps, vases, chandeliers, decorative cups ...) that were cast by the Siot-Decauville art foundry in Paris. He also produced several religious statues such as a "Joan of Arc" at the church of Gagny or "Saint-Antoine" at the Church of Saint-Antoine-des-Quinze-Vingts in Paris. Member of the jury of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the Salon of the French Artists, he joined the committee of the Society of French Artists in 1904. He was promoted officer of the Legion of Honor in 1910.

On June 3, 1912, Larche was knocked over by a car as he was walking at a friend's arm in the streets of Lagny and died during the day. In 1920, the Salon des artistes français organized a retrospective exhibition of his works at the Grand Palais in Paris. His widow proposed to donate her husband's works to the city of Bordeaux provided that a room Raoul-Larche was created in the Museum of Fine Arts. This hall, inaugurated in 1921, was abolished in the early 1930s, during which time the Art Nouveau had totally fallen out of favor with eyes of museum curators. On June 14, 1937, all the pieces of Raoul Larche's studio were on sale at the Hotel Drouot in Paris.