Getty Museum Adds Alexandre Charpentier’s 'Young Mother Breastfeeding Her Child' to Permanent Collection
The Getty Museum has acquired Young Mother Breastfeeding Her Child, a stoneware relief by French sculptor Alexandre Charpentier. The work, with a model date of 1882 and produced about 1895 by the Muller manufactory, measures 42 3/8 x 30 6/8 x 4 5/8 in. and was installed in December in the West Pavilion. Commissioned originally for a nursery in Villemomble near Paris, the relief shows a mother breastfeeding her infant and bears signatures of both Charpentier and the Muller factory.
The Signal
The acquisition adds a rare version of a composition first shown in plaster at the 1883 Salon to the museum's holdings of sculpture and decorative arts. It underscores Charpentier's role in Art Nouveau and his focus on everyday subjects rendered in low relief with Renaissance-inspired foreshortening, joining the single other known stoneware example at the Musée d'Orsay.
- Artists: Alexandre Charpentier
- People: Anne-Lise Desmas
- Museums: Getty Museum, Musée d’Orsay
- Locations: Los Angeles, Paris
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