Bust

C. Lacroix, Franco-Flemish

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The virtuoso Baroque carver, here signing C Lacroix fecit (under the man's left arm), was a Franco-Flemish native whose principal activity was in Genoa; he was possibly the same Lacroix, given name unrecorded, who was in Rome producing sculptures for the gardens at Versailles in 1680. Our subject has not been ascertained, but his identity may someday be unraveled through his dis tinctive pockmarked face and pugnacious profile. The two-ribbon tie was worn both in Genoa and at the court of Louis XIV. Lacroix established these details, as well as the pseudobrocade, with punctilio, but what really excited him was capturing the arrested flowing movement of wig and lace.

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