Bust of a Young Man

CC0 Public Domain Designation

1877

Aimé-Jules Dalou (French, 1838–1902)

This compelling portrait of a studio model—composed in just 90 minutes during a demonstration at a London art school—testifies to Aimé-Jules Dalou’s skill at shaping clay. The artist did not speak English, and so his classes were essentially visual performances: he rapidly modeled a sculpture in clay over the course of a lesson and directed students to follow his lead. The French-born British sculptor Édouard Lantéri later recalled that Dalou “completely carried his students away with him. He knew how to inspire them with the desire to work as well as the love of work, and succeeded in awakening an extraordinary enthusiasm where all before seemed dormant.”

Status: On View, Gallery 201
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Aimé-Jules Dalou
Title: Bust of a Young Man
Place: France (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1877
Medium: Patinated plaster
Dimensions: 70 × 44 × 32 cm (27 1/2 × 17 3/8 × 12 5/8 in.)
Credit Line: Purchased with funds provided by an anonymous donor honoring teachers and their students.
Reference Number: 2019.1235
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/252737/manifest.json

Jolyon Drury, Revelation to Revolution: The Legacy of Samuel Palmer: The Revival and Evolution of Pastoral Printmaking by Paul Drury and the Goldsmiths School in the 20th Century. (Ashford: J. Drury, 2006), 228-229.
Ben Thomas, ed. Alfred Drury and the New Sculpture. Exh. cat. (Canterbury: University of Kent, 2013), 7.
Matthew Withey, The Sculpture of Francis Derwent Wood. (London: Lund Humphries, 2015), 35, fig. 13.
Jolyon Drury, Revelation to Revolution: The Legacy of Samuel Palmer: The Revival and Evolution of Pastoral Printmaking by Paul Drury and the Goldsmiths School in the 20th Century. Exh. cat. (London: J. Drury, 2017), 162.
Alexandre Lafore, “Trois sculptures du XIXe siècle pour l’Art Institute de Chicago,” La Tribune de l’Art (December 2019): fig. 1.

Studio 3 Gallery, University of Kent, Canterbury, 30 September-20 December 2013; Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, University of Leeds, Leeds, 15 January-13 April 2014, Alfred Drury and the New Sculpture.
Tate Britain, London, 2 November 2017 – 7 May 2018; Petit Palais, Paris, 20 June – 14 October 2018, Impressionists in London: French Artists in Exile 1870-1904.
Royal Hospital Chelsea, London, 25 June – 1 July 2019, Masterpiece Art Fair.

Alfred Drury, RA (1856-1944), a gift from the artist in 1877; by descent to his son Paul Drury (1903-1987; by descent to his son Jolyon Drury; consigned by him to William Agnew European Sculpture and Works of Art, London, 2019.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.