Bronze bust of Napoleon Bonaparte, Luca Madrassi

Beautiful and proud bust of a young Napoleon Bonaparte, as 1st Consul of France. Beautiful patina of the bronze on a green marble base standing on a square plinth. Signed on the shoulder and stamped “Bronzes de Paris” in the back. The bust stands on a beautiful green marble pedestal.

Size: H bust 69cm – base 21 x 21 cm – H of the column 112 cm – total height of 181 cm

Lit: Luca Madrassi (Tricessimo in Italy 1848 – 1919) was an Italian sculptor who studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and became a French citizen. Creative, he mainly executed allegories and genre scenes in feet or bust. He regularly sent his work to the Salon.

Lit: On his return from Egypt in 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte arrived in Paris and took up residence in the Rue de la Victoire. He immediately began a series of meetings with all the leading figures in the capital, both political and military (the five Directors, Talleyrand, Moreau, Jourdan, Bernadotte, etc.). At the end of these meetings, he came to an agreement with Sièyès. The latter wanted a new regime to replace the Directoire, which had been discredited by public opinion. But the institutions did not allow for peaceful reform. A coup d’état would therefore be necessary. Siéyès only saw Bonaparte as the military man who would carry it out and enable him to achieve his aims. The operation took place on 9 November 1799 (18 Brumaire An VIII). More difficult to carry out than expected, it left Bonaparte in control of the situation. He took immediate advantage of the situation to upset his sponsor’s plans. Appointed First Consul (the other two were Sieyès and Roger-Ducos), he rejected the draft constitution devised by Sieyès and had another adopted that gave him full power (15 December 1799).