Charles Cumberworth

CHARLES CUMBERWORTH (France, 1811-1852)
"Indian huntress", ca.1840.
Patinated bronze.
Signed by the artist and by the chiseler Eugene Vittoz.
Measurements: 52 cm. height.

Sculptural group of great detail and narrative sensitivity. It represents a young indigenous hunter seated on a stump, in a moment of rest after a day of hunting. In one hand, she holds a downed game that shows her dexterity and self-sufficiency. On her back she carries a small child, held by an open weave shawl, modeled with meticulous realism, where each knot and tension of the fabric is carefully chiseled.

The young woman wears her hair tied back in a ponytail, and her torso remains uncovered, accentuating the naturalistic and ethnographic sense characteristic of these romantic representations of the "good savage" typical of the 19th century. She only wears a short skirt tight at the waist, whose decorative patterns have been worked with remarkable precision. The anatomy of the figure, from the softness of the facial features to the subtle tension of muscles and limbs, reveals a profound knowledge of the human body and a search for verisimilitude.

Charles Cumberworth, son of an English army officer and a Frenchwoman who moved with him to Paris. A student in 1829 of James Pradier at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he exhibited from 1833 to 1848 at the Salon, almost always female statues in a very classical style. Around 1840, we owe him the statue of Queen Marie Amélie and the Duke of Montpensier, as well as decorative objects such as vases, clocks and candlesticks. His most famous sculptures are L'Amour de soi (Museum of Fine Arts of La Rochelle), Lesbie et son moineau (Paris, Louvre Museum) and Paul et Virginie (1851). His works are kept in many museums, in particular the Louvre, the Musée de la Vie Romande in Paris, the Musée des Beaux-Arts de La Rochelle and the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.