STOUF, Jean-Baptiste

This statue was the sculptor’s reception piece for the French Royal Academy in 1785.

This statue was the sculptor’s reception piece for the French Royal Academy in 1785.

This statue was the sculptor’s reception piece for the French Royal Academy in 1785.

Belisarius was a loyal and successful general in the service of the Byzantine emperor Justinian. He had won major victories against the Vandals, Goths and Bulgarians, but he then became implicated in political intrigues, was accused of treason and disgraced. He became an outcast and was even reduced to begging.

Stouf’s Bust of Belisarius at the J. Paul Getty Museum shows the general of Justinian, blinded, as a beggar, in a manner that suggests a philosopher or saint.

Stouf exhibited this bust at the Salon of 1789.

Stouf exhibited this bust at the Salon of 1789.

Exhibited at the Salon of 1785, the work evokes the “heads of expression” that the pupils were preparing in the competition bearing this name at the Academy.

The marble bust of the great Flemish painter as commissioned in 1802 for the decoration of the Grande Galerie in the Louvre Museum.

Andr�-Ernest-Modeste Gr�try (1741-1813) was a French composer of operas, a leader in the evolution of French op�ra comique from light popular plays with music into semiserious musical drama. He enjoyed enormous popularity in Paris during his life-time and far into the 19th century. His statue by Stouf was formerly erected at the entrance of the Th�âtre Feydeau in Paris where his music was often performed. Forty-one of his some sixty operas are inscribed on the column of this statue.

The execution of Gr�try’s statue is connected with the project, endorsed by the Acad�mie Fran�aise, to create portraits of the great men of France.

Forty-one of Gr�try’s some sixty operas are inscribed on the column of this statue.