Directoire Consoles

Directoire Consoles

Composition work that I chose in the Directoire style of a pair of consoles:
So to begin I chose to reread "The Revolution" by François Furet.

– In the spacer of the consoles I chose for a return to the antique, the myth of the
metamorphosis of Zeus for the abduction of Leda, I studied its volumes first
in clay; Still in this spirit I sculpted in the center of the crosspieces cameos
garlanded with the effigy of a crowned woman and man.

– In the trumeaux I marked the revolutionary order with bundles of lictors
with peaks. I marked the “Enlightenment”, with geometric patterns that evoke the order
of reason. In the tops I composed two allegories:

1) success in love with laurels, quiver of arrows and torch (the theme of the
flame is repeated at the top of the pediments in a pyramidal construction) and the king
of the animals of the air, the eagle, embraces the motif (it was possible to use this
symbolism because the Directoire style unlike the political period, running from 1792 to 1802)
2) Fertility and abundance with the lion in the center, the king of the terrestrial animals.

Here is the whole thing gilded and painted with also repaints on gold. The fact of having opposed two trumeaux
with mirrors, we have the joy of the mise en abyme of the environment.

Pierre Kauffmann