Foal - Berthe Martinie (1883-1958)

Sculpture in bronze with a black patina
Signed twice " Martinie " on the base
With the foundry stamp " Valsuani "

France
circa 1935
height 21,2 cm

A similar model is exhibited at the Museum of Modern art in Paris (Inv. AMS 3).

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Biography :
Berthe Martinie (1883-1958), French painter and sculptor. From 1906 to 1908, she studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, in the only studio open to women, that of the painter Ferdinand Humbert (1842-1934). In 1913, Berthe married Henri Martinie, journalist and art critic, who supported her throughout her career. The beginnings of her family life and the First World War nevertheless marked an interruption in her creation.

Berthe Martinie frequented the sculptors Robert Wlerick (1882-1944) and Jean Carton (1911-1988). In 1925, the Weil gallery dedicated its first exhibition to her. At the end of the 1920s Martinie devoted herself exclusively to sculpture, of which animal subjects and the female nude were her predilection. She mastered both modeling and direct sculpting. She participated in numerous Salons (Salon d'Automne and Tuileries) as well as the Paris Universal Exhibition of 1937. At the Salon des Tuileries in 1933, the French State bought her a Doe and a Bull. Her career then developed abroad (United States, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, South America, etc.). After the Second World War, her sculptures were shown at the Brussels Universal Exhibition of 1958.

Among her many works, the French State commissioned a Wild Boar from Berthe Martinie in 1949, installed in Wilson Park in Thionville. She also created various reliefs for the wild beast house in the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. She also painted seven murals which adorn the former National Superior Conservatory of Music in Paris.