PERRAUD, Jean-Joseph - b. 1819 Monay, Jura, d. 1876 Paris

French academic sculptor who had a great reputation during the Second Empire, but his style fell out of fashion soon after his death.

Perraud was student at the École des Beaux-Arts from 1843 under Étienne-Jules Ramey and Augustin-Alexandre Dumont, co-winner of the Prix de Rome in 1847 with a plaster relief of Telemachus Carrying the Ashes of Hippias to Phalantes (probably destroyed). In his relief The Farewell (plaster, 1848-49; Lons-le-Saunier, Musée des Beaux-Arts), executed during his stay in Rome, Perraud simplified and refined a related motif with perfectionism. Although on his return to Paris he participated in the architectural decorations of the Second Empire (1851-70), contributing one of the façade groups, Lyric Drama (Echaillon stone, 1865-9), to the new Paris Opéra, his most concentrated effort was reserved for free-standing marble figures and groups. Examples are the Childhood of Bacchus (1861-63; Musée du Louvre, Paris) and the Despair (Musée d’Orsay, Paris).

He was officer in the Legion of Honour in 1867, and member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts. He is buried at Montparnasse Cemetery, Paris.

Despair

Perraud’s works, even at their most classical, afford a glimpse of Romantic anguish. He was admired by Auguste Rodin.

This statue was unanimously admired in plaster at the 1861 Salon and then in marble at the 1869 Salon. The piece struck them as a “giant step” in the evolution of sculpture. This figure, seated on the ground, according to a well-established convention, is intended to be an allegory of the tragic condition of human existence. The figure is without any accessories, and allows the viewer complete freedom of interpretation.