MARIUS MARS-VALLET (FRENCH, 1867-1957)

This sculptural figure, entitled Wuilfride, modelled by Mars-Vallet (Marius Vallet, 1869-1957), and executed in bronze by the Siot-Decauville foundry, was inspired by Sarah Bernhardt’s role as Mélissinde in Edmond Rostand's La Princesse Lointaine, which she performed from 1895 at the théâtre de la Renaissance in Paris (P. Kjellberg, Les Bronzes du XIXe Siecle, Paris, 1987, p. 462).
Mars-Vallet, the son of a marble-worker, and a pupil of Falguière, was both a sculptor and a medallist, who exhibited his works at the Salon from 1892 to 1896, and thereafter at the Nationale des beaux-arts. He received a number of official commissions, including, most notably, a statue of Jean-Jacques Rousseau for his home town of Chambéry. In 1904, he was appointed curator of the musée Savoisien, and in 1948, towards the end of his life, he gifted thirty-one of his sculptures to the museum.
Other examples have sold: Christie's, London, 26 October 2016, lot 32, £30,000 (J583); Bonhams, New York, 15 June 2010, lot 2140, $21,960 (L857).