Arthur Dupagne (1895-1961) - "woman With A Pitcher"

Bronze proof with dark brown patina Old cast circa 1950 without founder's mark Signed on the terrace at the back Height: 59 cm Galerie Paris Manaus Biography: Arthur DUPAGNE (1895-1961) Belgian School Arthur Dupagne was born on December 13, 1895 in Liège. He is said to have started sculpting at the age of nine, but his parents, who did not view an artistic career favorably, forced him to study technical skills and obtained a degree in mechanics, electricity and mining. Building on his success and despite family opposition, the young Dupagne took evening classes in sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Liège. He won first prize in each of the classes he attended and completed an eight-year course in four years. He then worked in Liège in his father's ironwork workshop for four years but devoted his free time to sculpture. He exhibited academic works at the 1924 Triennial Salon. His training as a technician allowed him to combine rigor and precision with his artistic sensitivity. The family business was experiencing difficulties and Arthur Dupagne had to support his wife and granddaughter. So, at the age of twenty-one, he went to the African continent as an engineer for a mining company. On June 6, 1927, he embarked alone for his first mission. He was an engineer in the service of the Société internationale forestière et minière du Congo in Tshikapa, in Tshorkwé country, where he worked on the exploitation of the diamond fields discovered on this site in 1910. In parallel with the exercise of his profession, he studied the ancestral statuary art of the Tshorkwé tribes (Batshock or Kioto), Mumpende and Bassala. He also passionately cast an artist's eye on the anatomy and gestures of Africans. He represents men and women in their nudity, supple and muscular. He abandons an academic point of view in favor of a realistic and powerful sculpture, he chooses subjects around him in their actions of daily life. His favorite working material is clay. Unfired, his clay sculptures were often bored by termites. Also, to preserve his pieces, he uses plastiline and plaster that he takes with him during his second mission. The very many sketches modeled during his stay serve him, on his return, to create works in bronze, but also in wood, stone and marble. In 1935, after 8 years of expatriation on the African continent, he completes his third mission on behalf of the mining company, returns to Belgium and presents his works in a gallery and this exhibition is very successful. Then, he devotes himself exclusively to his art. International Exhibition in Paris in 1937, Water Exhibition in Liège and International Exhibition in New York in 1939, Knight of the Order of the Crown in 1940.