Madame de Pompadour (1721–1764)

Jean-Baptiste Pigalle

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The portrait was completed in 1751 when Madame de Pompadour was thirty years old. It was probably meant for her residence château de Bellevue, which was finished the same year. She chose the stone for the bust, a hard and brittle marble, with the intention of promoting the use of local French materials. This piece was the first to be made of the white marble from the newly discovered quarry of Sost in the French Pyrenees.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art