Sculpture - The Winner At Cockfight By Alexandre Falguière (1831-1900) - Bronze

Bronze sculpture with green nuanced brown patina , representing a young man , running naked , jumping for joy , because his rooster has just won a fight .
His left foot and hand are suspended in the air , as if the boy were fixed in a victorious dance step .
He proudly holds a fighting rooster in his right arm .
The rooster's head , straight , shows the temperament of the conqueror .
The nudity of the boy's body indicates that the scene is set in Antiquity , in Greece or Rome .
The sculpture shows the moment following the fight : the presentation of the winning rooster which brings recognition and money from the bettors to the breeder of the animal .
Signature of the sculptor " Falguière " hollow on the terrace .
Circular foundry stamp .
Numbered sculpture .
Old cast iron .
19th century period .

Alexandre Falguière (1831-1900) 

Trained in the studio of the sculptor François Jouffroy at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris , Alexandre Falguière won "Le Prix de Rome" in 1859 , which enabled him to receive a government scholarship to study at the Villa Medici in Rome .
In 1864 , he sent to the Salon des Artistes , which is held every year in Paris , the fruit of his Italian work , the sculpture of the " Vainqueur Au Combat De Coqs " . The success is immediate .

Emperor Napoleon III , buys the original bronze sculpture .
It measures one meter seventy-four and is kept at the Musée d'Orsay .
Many replicas are then melted down to satisfy the demands of collectors .
Their sizes vary from 40 to 90 centimeters in height .

The sale of these sculptures provides Alexandre Falguière with a comfortable income , and places him in the position of prominent artist .
Falguière was then part of a group of sculptors , with Dubois , Mercié and Moulin , who were nicknamed the " Florentines ".
As in the city of Florence during the Renaissance , these sculptors draw their themes from antiquity .
They are also inspired by bronzes rediscovered in the ruins of Pompeii , reproductions of which circulate through Europe .

The sculpture is part of the emerging movement of the neo-Florentines .
References to the Renaissance , notably to the juvenile male figures of the sculptor Donatello , mingle with the classical inspiration of the subject .
The work was presented again at the Universal Exhibitions of 1867 and 1889 .