Alphonse Mucha and Auguste Seysses

Millon et associés, Paris, 5 May 1999, lot n° 164

Acquired from the above by the present owner

Private collection, France

L'Art et la Vie en France à la Belle Epoque, exhibition catalogue, Galerie Bendor, Paris, September - October 1971, the model referenced under n° 263

Mucha 1860-1939, peintures, illustrations, affiches arts décoratifs, exhibition catalogue, Grand Palais, Paris, 5 February - 28 April 1980, p. 256

Un ensemble Art Nouveau, la donation Rispail, exhibition catalogue, Musée d'Orsay, Paris, 21 November 2006 - 28 January 2007, p. 254-257

De la Belle Epoque aux années folles, La parfumerie au tournant du XXème siècle, exhibition catalogue, Musée international de la parfumerie, Grasse, 11 June - 30 September 2016, p. 73

The Femme aux lys is the result of a collaboration between Alphonse Mucha and the sculptor Auguste Seysses, which fully embodies the Art Nouveau aesthetic at the turn of the 20th century. The two artists had already collaborated in 1900 on the decoration of the storefront of Georges Fouquet’s store at 6 Rue Royale in Paris, for which Seysses created the bronze elements based on Mucha’s designs. Although Seysses’ signature appears on the base, the archives of the Musée d’Orsay, where another example of this model is preserved in their collections (inv. RF 4741), have made it possible to establish that the iconography, the sinuous lines, and the overall spirit fully reflect Mucha’s aesthetic, likely as the designer of the model and the original concept, while Seysses would have carried out all or part of the sculptural execution.