Étienne Maurice Falconet

Background

Étienne Maurice Falconet was born on December 1, 1716 in Paris, France.

Education

Étienne Maurice Falconet studied with the sculptor Jean Baptiste Lemoyne.

In 1754 Falconet was admitted to membership in the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture.

Career

Falconet was strongly influenced by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the great Italian baroque sculptor of the 17th century, and by Pierre Puget, the most important sculptor in 17th-century France to reflect the dynamic, emotional style created by Bernini.

During the 17506, however, Falconet was also creating decorative, intimate sculptures very different from the Milo.

Examples of this aspect of Falconet's talent are the marble Allegory of Music, the terra-cotta Allegory of Hunting, and the marble Cupid's Warning.

In these works Falconet displays great virtuosity in combining a rococo taste for intimacy, refined elegance, and delicate textures with simplicity of composition, sleek modeling, and smooth lines-characteristics of style that reflect advancing neoclassicism and adapt it to the still vibrant rococo.

Falconet's most important commission was executed for Empress Catherine the Great of Russia: the large bronze Equestrian Monument to Peter the Great in Leningrad (1766 - 1782).

The work makes references to antiquity and to neoclassicism, however, in the clarity of the composition, smooth modeling of the horse, majestic figure of the Emperor, and restrained treatment of his draperies.

Falconet produced a relatively small number of sculptures, but his work is remarkable in its variety and skill.

Further Reading The most important works on Falconet are in French.

His life and works are discussed in Lady Emilia Francis Dilke, French Architects and Sculptors of the 18th Century (1900).

There are references to Falconet and photographs of three of his works in Arno Schönberger and Halldor Soehner, The Rococo Age (1960).

Achievements

• Étienne Maurice Falconet was a versatile and facile French sculptor, incorporated late baroque, rococo, and neoclassic elements in his work and reflected the changes in artistic taste that occurred during his era.

Connections

The painter Pierre-Étienne Falconet was his son.

Son:

Pierre-Étienne Falconet