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françois-marie poncet (1736–1797) A Pair of Fauns One signed, PONCET . F . ROMA . White marble 23 1⁄2 in. (59.7 cm) overall provenance: Private collection, Rome François-Marie Poncet was one of the main Neoclassical exponents of sculpture after the antique, working in Rome in the last third of the eighteenth century. After studying with Falconet at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Paris, he went on to become a member of the Accademia degli Arcadi and later a member of the Accademia di Bologna. Poncet was known amongst his contemporaries as a sculptor of great talent, although hitherto there have been only eight works extant by him known. This re-discovered pair makes a significant addition to his signed work. The present pair of beautifully carved white marble statues are amongst the most elegant representations of Grand Tour taste. Their subject, two fauns, was at the forefront of the subjects favoured by English milordi making the Grand Tour. Many of the great country seats, as well as city residences, belonging to the cultured British tourists, like the great palaces of Europe, especially Rome, had small-scale and large-scale models in marble and bronze after the most celebrated statues of antiquity. The present pair are high-quality versions of notable antiques, surely made for a high-ranking client. This pair of statues were carved c. 1765, when the resurgent taste for classical decoration and decorative art was at its height. Its chief exponents were Robert Adam and G.B. Piranesi. One can imagine the pair of fauns beautifully posed on a Neoclassical console table or a classically proportioned chimneypiece in an interior inspired by the antique such as Harewood House, Yorkshire, or Kedleston Hall, Derbyshire. related literature
S. Lami, Dictionnaire des Sculpteurs de l’école française au XVIII siècle, II, Paris, 1911; ed. Kraus, Paris, 1970 O. Michel, ‘François-Marie Poncet (1736–97) et le retour a l’Antique in Lyon et l’Italie’, Etudes d’histoire de l’art, 1984
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