Genius of the Dance

Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Carpeaux’s high relief on the façade of the Opéra Garnier in Paris, with its naturalistic nudes embodying Dance, is one of the great monuments of Second Empire style. The limestone group was vilified and even splattered with ink but also found admirers, as witness the many bronze reductions of the crowning figure, an inspired teenager who conducts the rhythms of the dancers. This cast, with its very evident seams, is a chef modèle, which was easily disassembled and its separate parts then served for the casting of more elegantly assembled and finished commercial editions.

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