A Fine Quality Large Patinated Bronze Group Sculpture Entitled La Sirene by Puech

The bronze sculpture titled "La Sirene" depicting a winged sea creature holding a human figure on her shoulders; signed "D. Puech" and titled in casting.

Artist: Denys-Pierre Puech (1854-1942)
Date: 19th century
Origin: French
Dimension: 37 1/2 in. x 27 in. x 16 in


Notes: Puech conceived the idea for ‘La Sirene’ during his stay at the Villa Medici when he fell passionately in love with the celebrated opera singer Emma Calvé, who was then performing in Rome. Peuch wrote, "it is to her that I owe the inspiration for the group." The sculpture shows a winged chimeric siren with a tail of a fish abducting a Ephebus. Puech noted the rarity of the scene of a woman abducting a man, rather than the more common depiction of a man carrying away a female victim. Peuch says, “I had the presentiment that, with the Siren's rape of the Ephebus, I could express the force of passion, which reached towards the unknown, which, itself, might be fidelity or the fall..." In Greek mythology the sirens seduced sailors with their singing only to lead them to their death in the sea.

Literature: Denys Puech 1854-1942, ex. cat., Musée des Beaux Arts Denys Puech, Rodez, 1993, pp. 94-5