TWO FRENCH PATINATED BRONZE FIGURAL TORCHERES, ENTITLED 'FEMME INDIENNE' AND 'ESCLAVE INDIEN'

These figural torchères were edited by the fondeur Ferdinand Barbedienne (d. 1892). Both are in the Orientalist style inspired by the Middle East and its exoticism. Esclave Indien by Toussaint was exhibited alongside its pendant female figure at the 1850 Salon and a pair were commissioned by the French state on 23 February of that year for the Ministre de l'Intérieur at the Elysée Palace. A large bronze cast of Guillemin's Femme Indienne was first exhibited in 1872 and a pair of these candelabra-bearing figures - perhaps the original exhibited bronze casts - flanked the entrance of the Barbedienne family residence and were sold as Belles orientales aux flambeaux at the Hôtel des Ventes, Enghien, 4 March 1984 (530,000 francs).
The present figures are each examples of the second largest size edited by Barbedienne as listed in his 1886 catalogue.