Jean Boucher (November 20 1870, Cesson-Sévigné - June 17 1939, Paris). was a French sculptor based in Brittany.
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Biography
Boucher was born in Cesson-Sévigné near Rennes, Brittany. After his early schooling Boucher learned the trade of a blacksmith, but very soon he was attracted by the arts of drawing and sculpture. Pierre Lenoir, professor at the regional school of Rennes, taught the rudiments of fine art to him, and soon realised his young pupil's aptitude. He obtained a government grant to continue his studies in Paris where he met his mentors Alexandre Falguière at the l'école des beaux arts and Henri-Michel-Antoine Chapu of the Académie Julian. Both gave him a respect for truth in sculpture, a product of the wider trend of Realism associated with Jules Dalou and Auguste Rodin. In 1898 Boucher joined the Bleus de Bretagne, an organisation founded to promote liberal values in Brittany. Boucher was described as a "Breton, Dreyfusard and freethinker". In this capacity he was commissioned to create a sculpture commemorating the the skeptical thinker Ernest Renan in Renan's home town of Tréguier. The sculpture, depicting Renan with the goddess Athena, was immensely controversial, being interpreted as a challenge to Catholicism, especially as it was placed beside the cathedral. Major protests accompanied its installation. Boucher's sculpture allegorically representing the union of Brittany with France also created controversy, and was bombed by Breton separatists in 1932.[1] Fragments of the broken work have been preserved. Boucher did his duty as a soldier during the First World War. Called to bear arms with the rank of sergeant, he ended the war as a lieutenant, winner of the Military Cross, and suffering the effects of gassing. Appointed Professor at the l'école des beaux-Arts, he continued to work on his art, devoting much of his time to creating memorials to the soldiers who died for France. He is the creator of the monuments dedicated to the "Saint-Cyriens", to the marshal Joseph Gallieni of Verdun, to the American volunteers, to the aviator Èdouard Mounier and others, such as Yves Guyot, Charles Goffic and the poet Andre Rivoire. He was elected an official of the Academy des Beaux-Arts in February 29, 1936, to replace Hippolyte Lefévre. In his last years Boucher was working on new designs for a replacement for the bombed monument to Breton unity with France. He completed maquettes of more than one proposed design. One of the objections of Breton nationalists to the earlier statue had been that it portrayed the duchess Anne of Brittany kneeling submissively before the King of France, so the new designs carefully stressed the equality of the figures. However, the replacement project was abandoned after Boucher's death and the outbreak of war in 1939.[2] After Boucher's death his son Jean-Marie Boucher created an association dedicated to preserve interest in his father's work. Following his own death in 2000 a new Association des Amis de Jean Boucher (Friends of Jean Boucher) was formed in Rennes. Its honorary presidents are Jean-Paul Belmondo and Edmond Hervé.[3]
Major works
Monument to Ernest Renan in Tréguier (1902). Two monumental statues of Louis Léopold Ollier, one in his native village, Les Vans, and the other on the Place Ollier in Lyon, which was destroyed during the Second World war. The Union of Brittany and France, in the niche of the town hall of Rennes (1911), partially destroyed on August 7 1932 by Breton nationalists. Victor Hugo in exile (1913) in Guernsey. A reduced version of this statue is in the House of Victor Hugo, Hôtel de Rohan-Guéménée, in the IVieme district of Paris. Monument to the Marshal Joseph Gallieni (1926) in Place Vauban in the XVIIieme district of Paris Monument to the Marshal Marie Émile Fayolle (1935) in Place Vauban in the XVIIieme district of Paris. War memorial representing a "Poilu" in the Cour du Mûrier at the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts de Paris.
