French school. Art Nouveau, ca.1900.

French school. Art Nouveau, ca.1900.
Bust of "Althea".
Painted terracotta.
Presents manufacturing marks and numbering on the back.
With lack of polychrome and slight flaking.
Measurements: 58 x 42 x 24 cm.

Female bust of Art Nouveau style. It represents a naiad or nymph. Her half-closed eyelids underline the dreamlike cadence that emanates from her ethereal physique. Her long wavy hair is ornamented with water flowers, like water lilies, an element indicative of the naiads, one of the Greek mythological figures that modernist artists preferentially recovered to reinvent them in their own delicate way, brimming with sensuality.