Jean Boucher (artist)

Jean Boucher (November 20, 1870, Cesson-Sévigné, Ille-et-Vilaine – June 17, 1939, Paris) was a French sculptor based in Brittany. He is best known for his public memorial sculptures which communicated his liberal politics and patriotic dedication to France and Brittany.

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. In the 1890s he worked on restorations for the cathedral of Saint Samson in Dol-de-Bretagne, which he later described as his true school. He obtained a government grant to continue his studies in Paris where he met his mentors Alexandre Falguière at the Ecole 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 by Armand Dayot as a "Breton, Dreyfusard and freethinker". In this capacity he was commissioned to create a sculpture commemorating 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 association with liberal and anti-clerical values led to a commission to depict the liberal hero Victor Hugo in exile on Guernsey, not far from the Breton coast. Hugo is depicted looking out from the island back to France, brooding over his exile, and standing on a rocky outcrop. In 1907 Boucher created a multi-figure memorial to prominent Dreyfus supporter and human rights activist Ludovic Trarieux in Place Denfert-Rochereau, Paris. Another large marble in Paris is at the Place Saint-Ferdinand. It depicts Léon Serpollet in his land speed record winning steam car, surrounded by children enveloped by the steam.

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