Gabriel-Jules Thomas

With Elstir Gallery, France, 1990;

From whom acquired.

The present terracotta depicts a mythological figure, perhaps Ceres, the goddess of agriculture and fertility, seated atop a globe, breastfeeding a putto, and, as the title suggests, is an allegorical representation of the Earth.

Like many artists of his time, Gabriel-Jules Thomas was classically trained and taught the importance of Greek and Roman art. He began his formal education at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he was a pupil of the celebrated sculptor François Dumont, before leaving for Rome to complete the obligatory sojourn for artists. This trip allowed him to experience the artistry of antiquities first-hand. In 1848, at barely the age of 24, Thomas won the Prix de Rome for his sculpture entitled Philoctète partant pour le siège de Troie (Philoctetes Leaves for the Siege of Troy) executed in plaster and housed today at École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Upon his return to Paris, Thomas embarked on an artistic campaign that was rooted in his training and the aesthetics of Neoclassicism. Products of this endeavor include a marble statue of Virgil, now at the Musée d'Orsay, a group of Hippocrates and Hygieia erected for the Faculté de médecine in Paris, and the façade of the Gare du Nord train station in Paris.

RELATED LITERATURE:

S. Lami, Dictionnaire des Sculpteurs de L’École Française, vol. IV, Paris 1921, pp. 301-307.