Bear Cub Grooming

In 1889, the French-trained sculptor Paul Wayland Bartlett earned a Grand Prix for his life-size bronze Bohemian Bear Tamer at the Exposition Universelle in Paris. The multi-figure sculpture was purchased for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1891 by "a group of gentlemen." Bartlett capitalized on the success of Bohemian Bear Tamer (91.14) by casting bronze reductions after the gypsy figure and standing bear, as well as after the seated bear cub scratching behind his right ear. He was one of the first American sculptors savvy to the potential of generating income by issuing editions of small bronzes after large groups and public monuments. The Met’s Bear Cub Grooming was sand cast in a French foundry, and then skillfully chased and patinated to enhance the artist’s lively surface modeling and the rich texture of fur tufts. Bartlett’s sophisticated knowledge of animal anatomy, expertly revealed in this charming statuette, was learned through study with the leading French animal sculptor Emmanuel Frémiet. The statuette is stamped TIFFANY & CO., suggesting that it was sold through Tiffany’s retail showrooms in New York, a leading distributor of small bronze sculptures in the early years of the twentieth century.