Albert Cheuret

Albert Cheuret was born in Paris in 1884, and studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts under Jacques Perrin and Georges Lemaire. In 1907 he established a studio close to the Champ de Mars, and thereafter exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français, part of a milieu that included Auguste Rodin, Antoine Bourdelle, and Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux. In 1908 one of his sculptures was recognized with the top prize by the Réunion des fabricants de bronze at the association’s yearly competition.

After the war (in which he served bravely, and after which he was decorated for his service), Cheuret resumed his practice and secured a number of high level commissions. His work, like that of many artists of the period, bears the influence of images of Tutankhamun’s tomb promulgated after its discovery in 1922, and the new aesthetic forms and manners of representation, particularly of the natural world, which it introduced into western arts and crafts.

Cheuret’s work, however, stood out from the rest, distinct not only for its supreme craft—his masterly execution in bronze and alabaster—but for his elegant depiction of the natural subjects that so inspired him—wild animals, in particular birds, and flora—with the clean, industrial lines of the Art Deco.

At the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1925, Albert Cheuret famously rented a stall on the Pont Alexandre III and there sold his clocks, furnishings, small sculptures, and, most notably, light fixtures. His many prominent commissions include the commemorative structures at the Cimetière du Montparnasse and the Cimetière du Père-Lachaise, as well as the Monument aux morts in Cannes.

Cheuret died in 1966.