Paul Aubé by Édouard Dantan for the Petit Palais

15/1/25 - Acquisition - Paris, Petit Palais, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris - As (well) inspired as ever in its purchases, the Petit Palais ended the year with a very fine coup, setting its sights on an extremely interesting painting that seemed destined to join its collections. An unpublished work by Édouard Dantan, Portrait of the Sculptor Paul Aubé Working in his Studio (ill. 1) is also an artistic testament in that it is the artist’s last work, painted a few months before his accidental death in a horse-drawn carriage accident [1] in July 1897. A portrait of friendship, this one is signed, dated and dedicated in the lower right-hand corner: "À mon ami / PAUL AUBÉ / E. DANTAN / 1897". Remaining in the model’s family, it was acquired from Geoffroy Dassé Antiquités, in Mers-les-Bains, and will be presented at the museum as part of a promising exhibition exploring portraits of artists, scheduled for spring 2026 from the collections of the Petit Palais, which also houses a fine collection of emblematic works by this sculptor.

The Paris museum is proud to present the full-size plaster of Dante (ill. 2), a model of which is easily recognisable on the table behind the sculptor. The best-known work of its creator, born in Longwy and a pupil of Dantan Aîné, Édouard’s father, it triumphed at the Salon of 1879, where it was a great success. It was acquired by the City of Paris to be cast in bronze by Henri Moltz and installed in 1882 in front of the Collège de France, where it still stands today [2]. The large plaster cast of the Dante was then presented at the Universal Exhibitions in Vienna in 1882 and Paris in 1889 and 1900, before suffering the fate common to Parisian statues of the…