MARCEL DERNY
French, 1914-2003
"Serpent" (1946)
Polychromed stoneware | signed verso "DERNY 1946"
19 1/8" H including base (base is 1 5/8" H) x 5 1/4" D x 12" W
Executed in 1946, the composition presents a coiled serpent with wings rising sharply from its back, its surface richly textured with scales accentuated by layers of mottled glaze. The loose handling and highly impressionistic treatment of the surfaces balances naturalistic detail with a modernist sense of rhythm and movement, the entire form feeling energetic and hyper-tangible. The surface polychromy, achieved through layered firing and glaze applications, enhances the undulating contours of the serpent's body.
Almost certainly a unique example, possibly created as a model for Sevres.
Marcel Derny (1914–2003)
Marcel Louis Derny was born on January 3, 1914, in Paris. The son of a soldier killed in the First World War, he spent part of his youth in the Sarthe region before moving to Algeria. Here his deep attraction to animals started to develop: he began to understand them and actively modeled them in clay. In 1928 at just fourteen years of age he exhibited at the Orientalist Salon in Algiers where he was awarded a first prize.
From 1931 to 1934, Derny studied at the École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris under the sculptor Paul Belmondo. In 1933, he was awarded the Grand Prix for Ornamental Sculpture. Following his studies, he joined the Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres in 1934 as an intern, where he began specializing in animalier sculpture in glazed stoneware. Here he would ultimately produce over 160 models. He had a preference for wild animals: elephants, gorillas, lions, bears, squirrels, deer, birds and panthers. Occasionally he would model a domestic animal as well, executing numerous horse models as well as cats and other domestic animals.
In 1939, Derny produced a monumental Royal Tiger in stoneware that was purchased by the French State for the Musée des Colonies. After the Second World War, he worked in Saint-Cloud in the workshop of Léon-Georges Baudry, contributing to the decoration of the ocean liner Île-de-France. When Baudry was appointed director of the Sèvres manufactory, Derny succeeded Jean-Baptiste Gauvenet as sculptor and he produced a substantial body of work during this period until illness forced him into retirement in the mid-1970s.
Derny exhibited regularly from 1949 onward as a member of the Salon de la Nationale des Beaux-Arts and took part in exhibitions both in France and abroad. His work was executed in both bronze and stoneware,much of which is today preserved in important public collections including the Musée national de Céramique in Sèvres, the Musée des Années Trente in Boulogne-Billancourt, the Musée des Arts décoratifs in Paris, the Musée d’Art et d’Industrie La Piscine in Roubaix, and the Musée du Quai Branly.
Throughout his career, he received numerous honors. He was awarded the Palmes académiques in 1952, named Chevalier des Arts et Lettres in 1976, and promoted Officier des Arts et Lettres in 1982. In 1999, he was recognized in Japan as a “Living Treasure.” Marcel Derny died on April 29, 2003, in Clamart.
Literature:
- Dictionnaire illustré des Sculpteurs Animaliers & Fondeurs de l'antiquité à nos jours, vol. I, Jean-Charles Hachet, p. 301 [biography]
Condition: Very fine original condition. No observed flaws or blemishes.
ref. 508PBW19Z
