19th & 20th Century Bronze Sculptures

Original Works of Art

As you have found from your reading of this information on bronze sculpture and casting techniques, bronzes are made in editions. An original edition is one that was created from the artist's original work in clay, wax, or plasticine. The artist oversaw the production of the bronzes, usually working directly in the foundry among the foundrymen.  A successful Salon exhibit receiving a Gold Medal could result in hundreds of orders for an artist's sculpture.  This could cover a production period of several months as more orders for the bronze came into the artist's studio. Most of the French artists used several of the Paris foundries for their cast work.  The foundries and the artist did not keep records regarding the size of editions or the total number of casts created. When a foundry finished with the order the artist would take their master model and all of the casts with them.  The next edition could be cast by another foundry altogether.  Due to the extremely high cost of casting art in bronze many works were cast in editions of as few as 10 sculptures as the artist had to pay for all of the production run out of their pocket before casting began.  Some of the more successful artists such as Pierre Jules Mene and Antoine Louis Barye established their own foundries for the casting of their bronzes.  We guarantee all works we sell to be either original editions or editions that were authorized by the artist, the artist's estate, or only those having the legal rights to cast the artist's work from their original molds and models.  The bronzes that are on display in most of the major museum collections in the world are also from these same original editions.