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Lion Crushing a Serpent
1832
By Antoine Louis Barye (1796-1875)
Bronze, height 54" (granite base 38")
This is Rittenhouse Square's most prized sculpture, created by the prolific French sculptor Antoine Louis Barye. The plaster original for this piece was purchased by the French Minister of State from the Salon exhibition of 1833 in France. He ordered it to be cast in bronze and it was shown in the Salon of 1836 in France and then placed in the garden of the Tuileries Palace.
The bronze cast in Rittenhouse Square is a bronze cast of the original that now stands in the Salle de Barye of the Louvre. Philadelphia's bronze was cast sometime in the period of 1889-91 and may have possibly been the bronze displayed at the Universal Exposition of 1889 or it could have been reproduced at this time to take advantage of the French and rising American interest for Barye.
Baryre created this piece to express the allegory of the French resolution of 1830: the lion symbolizes the power of good, who conquers the serpent, who represents evil.
The Fairmount Park Association purchased this piece in 1891 and it was placed in the center of Rittenhouse Square in 1893.
source: www.pages.drexel.edu/~abp39/final/sculptures.html
identifier: ~ GAC_0397
image by Photo George
copyrighted: ©2008 GCheatle
all rights reserved
Love conquers ♥. Visit the National Gallery of Art's exhibition on "Heaven and Earth: Art of Byzantium from Greek Collections," in D.C. until March 2, 2014.