Marcel Gimond

Marcel Gimond (1894–1961) was a French sculptor born in the Ardèche region of France.

Gimond first studied at the Beaux-Arts Academy in Lyon and was the student in turn of both Aristide Maillol and Auguste Rodin. Gimond was an influential Professor at the Paris École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts until 1960. He was uniquely invited to exhibit his modelled busts at both the salon and with the surrealists.

Garlanded with the Grand Prix National des Arts in 1957, Gimond, who was the son of a metal-worker, is considered to be France's last great portraitist or sculptor of the bust. The possessor of a vast sculptural knowledge, Gimond was famed for his purified style which sought the permanence of forms beneath his subjects' individuality .

Marcel Gimond maintained a concise critique of sculpture, and taught that monumentality in sculpture was universal throughout the civilizations of the world, in recognition of the varied sculptural achievements of Egyptian, Khmer, Sumerian or pre-Columbian art; holding that "Art is a language, the sole which has the privilege to be universal, and which, across frontiers, can unite all that which is not alien to humanity."

Gimond is known for his many Heads and Portraits of Political and Artistic figures and his distinctive bronze busts are to be seen in numerous museums in France, Luxembourg and in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

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