Bacchante

Country: Spain

Manufactory: Lladro

Date of establishment: 2004

Sculptor: Francisco Polope

Size (cm): 48*59

Limited Series

Porcelain Story

For many years this beautiful composition was the largest in our collection. Not even so - this work was the first major work acquired by us at a time when the collection was just beginning to take shape and we still did not really imagine what this hobby of ours could turn out to be. Simply, traveling around the world, acquiring everything. No, well, not everything, of course, but something that could arouse interest among people who had just fallen in love with porcelain. True, falling in love seriously and for a long time.

At that time we didn't know much about porcelain either. And a series of trips to world-famous museums, in whose collections of porcelain pieces were presented, were still ahead of us. But, I remember, several rooms in our rural house had already been turned into a kind of exhibition salon, where this Bacchante stood out for her huge, as it seemed to us then, size. We, of course, guessed that in the world there are porcelain works much larger, but we have not yet seen them. Now, when our collection contains dozens of works, the size of which exceeds a meter (both in height and in length), we understand how naive we were at that time.

Admiring the exquisite beauty of this work, we did not yet know that in many years we would get to know its author, Francisco Polope. That in our collection more than 70 of his outstanding works will eventually be collected. That his new Bacchante, which will use the most modern technologies, will shock the world of collectors with its fantastic ingenuity of details and colors. And then we still had only this first Bacchante of his.

By the way, it was created based on the painting of the great French artist Adolphe-William Bouguereau, which was called ''Bacchante on a Panther''. One of the future brightest masters of French classical painting began as an apprentice in a grocery store, carefully drawing product labels. Recognition came to him after graduating from the Royal School in Bordeaux. In the Parisian annual salons, where Bouguereau's paintings were regularly exhibited, in the years 1878-1885 he was even awarded the title of the best painter of France several times. The artist died in 1905 and was buried in the famous Montparnasse cemetery.

And the famous Spanish sculptor Francisco Polope, to our happiness, continues to live and create unique porcelain works, delighting collectors in many countries of the world. By the way, Francisco personally signed this work for our family during his visit to us.