Georges Saupique

Biography

After studies at the Stanilas college in Paris and the lycee Henri-IV, he studied at Paris' Ecole nationale superieure des beaux-arts his teachers including Hippolyte Lefebvre, Jules Coutan and Aristide Rousaud. During the 1914-1918 war he served as a Lieutenant in the Chasseurs a pied. He married Jacqueline Bouchot a professor at the Ecole du Louvre. He was a friend of the sculptor Raymond Delamarre and started to show his work at the Salon des artistes francais in 1922. In 1923 he also exhibited at the Salon d'automne and in 1925 took part in the Exposition internationale des Arts decoratifs and presented there his bas-relief "L'Auroch" in the exhibition's pavilion called "La Douce France" which was awarded the international prize for architecture. In 1935 some of this pavilion was erected in Etampes- See entry below. From 1926 he exhibited his work at the Salon des Tuileries and in 1927 the financier Octave Homberg commissioned Saupique to decorate the hall of his office in Paris' rue Pasquier.  Saupique took two years to complete four large allegories L'Afrique noire", L'Indochine, L'Afrique du Nord, et Les Antilles", each 21 metres high. These are held in a private collection. Saupique also created several reliefs for the front of the rue Pasquier building and seven of these are still in place. In 1931 he sculpted the "Fontaine des lions" for the AOF building and decorated one of the exhibitions pavilions (the SFFC). Clearly Saupique had a love of and a knowledge of animals. 1935 saw him commissioned to work on four bas-reliefs for the ocean liner "Normandie" and then in 1936 work started on building the Eglise du Sacre-Cœur in Gentilly for use by the Cite universitaire and Saupique was commissioned to execute several stone sculptures both inside and outside the church including some magnificent bas- reliefs around the main entrance door as well as four bronze angels for the bell tower. Work on the decoration of the palais de Chaillot for the Paris exhibition of 1937 gave work opportunities to 57 sculptors and Saupique worked on a huge relief on the side of the building giving on to the rue Franklin. This was called "L'Asie". After the war he worked often with Louis Leygue including the massive restoration needed on Reims cathedral by Henri Deneux. He was the sculptor of one of the bronze works making up the Memorial de la France combattante at mont Valerien.  In 1946 he worked on his most popular work, the bust of Marianne. Le musee du Louvre  in Paris,  the  musee des Annees Trente at Boulogne-Billancourt and the musee Rodin at t Meudon all hold several of his works. Saupique created a huge body of work in his lifetime and this is a summary of most of these sculptures. He was involved in war memorials covering both World Wars.

Statue of Hector Berlioz

In 1886 a bronze statue of Berlioz had been erected in Paris' square Hector-Berlioz in the 9th arrondissement but this had been requisitioned by the Germans in 1941 and the bronze melted down for re-use. In 1948 a replacement had been sculpted in stone by Saupique.

Bust of Jacques Jaujard

Jaujard was a director of the Musees de France and Saupique's bronze bust of him is kept in the Musee du Louvre departement des Sculptures.

"Normandie"

Saupique created several decorative works for the passageways of the ocean liner "Normandie" which was broken up in 1942.  One bas-relief depicted the voyage of Eric the Red to Greenland, another the "Normans in Scicilly" and Odin Freya entering the Seine in a fleet of drakkars.

Le Monument neoceltique d’Etampes

The "Pergola de la Douce France" is located in the gardens of the Tour Guinette in Etampes and was part of a larger composition created in 1925 for the Exposition des Arts decoratifs et industriels.  It was acquired by Etampes in 1934.  The work comprises four large stone blocks on which sixteen bas-reliefs have been created by various sculptors. Saupique executed the reliefs  "Le Saint Graal" and  "L’Aurochs".  The remaining reliefs include  "Les serpents des druides" executed by members of Pierre Seguin's workshop, two works by Louis Nicot called "Le Cerf" and "Taliesin et Ganieda",  Pablo Manes  "Lancelot et Guenievre", "Le Cheval sauvage" by Georges Hilbert, Ossip Zadkine's "Le Dragon", Raoul Lamourdedieu's two works  "Merlin et Viviane" and "Joseph d’Arimathie", Joachim Costa's three works called "Tristan et Iseult", " La fee Koridwen" and  "Le nain Gwyon ", Jan and Joel Martel's "L’ile d’Avalon" and "Le roi Arthur" and Francois Pompon's "Le Sanglier".

Monument to Francois Rabelais

This 1946 Saupique sculpture is in front of the Meudon town hall. Francois Rabelais was the parish priest of Meudon from 1551 to 1553.

Villeneuve-sur-Lot Hotel de ville

A good example of Saupique's bust of "Marianne" can be seen here.

"La bienvenue"

Saupique's statue of a woman holding flowers can be seen in Barentin.

Monument to Henri Bouchot in Besancon

This statue dates to 1907 and stands in the square Henri-Bouchot. It was originally in bronze but was melted down by the Vichy regime. A replacement in stone executed by Saupique.

Bust of Sergent Jules Bobillot

Sergent Bobillot had been badly injured in the siege of Tuyen Quang (Tonkin) in 1882 and finally died in Hanoi in 1885. His remains were returned to Paris in 1996.

In 1888 Auguste Paris had created a bust of Bobillot which was placed in Paris'  place Paul Verlaine. This was destroyed by the Germans in 1942 during the occupation and Saupique executed a new bust in 1959.

Sculpture on Rouen's Pont Boieldieu

The Pont Boieldieu was rebuilt in 1955, connecting the rue Grand-Pont on the river's right bank with the rue St Sever on the left bank and two huge sculptures are positioned on each side of the bridge.  Georges Saupique and Jean-Marie Baumel were the sculptors involved and worked on the compositions between 1956 and 1957. The sculptures recall Rouen's maritime history. Baumel's  two sculptures are on the right side of the bridge and Saupique was responsible for the two on the left.  Baumel's sculptures depict the Rouen navigator and explorer Cavelier de La Salle heading an expedition towards America and the Normans sailing towards England in a drakkar..  On the left side of the bridge are the two Saupique sculptures, one an allegory of the river entitled "Les affluents de la Seine" and the other an allegory of the sea entitled "Ocean, pere de l'aventure". Recently ten busts have been added to the bridge, these depicting great navigators of the past;  (Jean de Bethencourt, Jacques Cartier, Cavelier de la Salle, Christophe Colomb, James Cook, Vasco de Gama, Ferdinand Magellan, Jean-Francois de Galaup, comte de Laperouse, Marco Polo and Amerigo Vespucci, all works by the sculptor Jean-Marc de Pas. The bridge is the only Rouen bridge which is riveted rather than welded and it is located between the Pont Pierre-Corneille and the Pont Jeanne d’Arc.  It was naned after the Rouen born composer Francois Adrien Boieldieu. 

The Vincennes Hotel de ville

In 1933 Saupique was commissioned to work on one of three "dessus-de-porte" to be placed above the doors of the new "salle des fetes".  His composition involved allegorical figures representing commerce and industry supporting the Vincennes' coat of arms.

The bas-relief "Asia" Palais de Chaillot

Part of the reconstructed Palais de Chaillot for the 1937 Paris exhibition involved bas-reliefs on the blank walls and one of these is by Saupique. It can be seen on the wall facing the rue Franklin.

Bust of Marianne

To mark the start of the French Fourth Republic,  a competition was held to have a bust of Marianne sculpted and Saupique was the winner.  There are copies of the bust throughout France including Poitiers hotel de ville.

Animal reliefs on 34 de la rue Pasquier in Paris

This building was built in 1929 in the Art Deco style by architects Alex and Pierre Fournier as the office of the Societe francaise et coloniale and Saupique was commissioned to decorate the facade with reliefs of exotic animals including a camel, an elephant, a crocodile, a tiger and various birds. Another depicted fish in a fisherman's boat. The reliefs were executed in colored marble and Venetian enamel.

Gallery of images-34 Rue Pasquier

Mascaron (architecture) for the Damparis factory of Ets Jacob-Delafon

Saupigue created several mascarons for the exterior of the factory.

Le Havre railway station (gare du Port Autonome)

In 1952 Saupique carried out some sculptural decoration for this station but this was removed when further changes made in 1963.

Chapel of St Guenole

Saupique's granite calvary can be seen at this Beg Meil church. The work dates to 1941

Saint-Brieuc Cathedral

Saupique executed a "Chemin de Croix" and a depiction of the Assumption in 1958 for this cathedral. Both were in granite.

Eglise Saint-Germain d’Aix-Noulette

Saupique executed statues of St Barbara and St Nicholas for this church in 1937/1938.

Restoration work for Reims cathedral

Reims cathedral was badly damaged by German artillery fire in the 1914-1918 war! including the famous sculpture above the entrance "Le Couronnement de la Vierge".  Many of the damaged sculptures from the cathedral can be seen in the Palais du Tau.   In 1955 Saupique made a copy of "Le Couronnement de la Vierge" which can be seen above the cathedral entrance and with Louis Leygue copied many of the other sculptures on the cathedral facade. He also executed a statue of St Thomas for the north tower.

Arras Cathedral

Saupique worked on the cathedral's main altar and the tomb of Mgr Julien, Eveque d'Arras.

"Jeanne au bucher" in Rouen cathedral

Saupique completed this statue in 1956. It depicts Joan of Arc at the stake.

Eglise de l'assomption de la Tres Sainte Vierge at Milon-la-Chapelle

Saupique's bas-relief entitled  "la resurrection des poilus" in this church serves as Milon-la-Chapelle's war memorial 

Tympanum on Eglise du Sacre-Coeur in Gentilly

Between 1933 and 1936, this catholic church was built mainly to serve the students of the nearby Cite Universitaire. The architect was Pierre Pacquet. Saupique carried out the sculptural decoration involved, mainly a tympanum and other deciaration around the main entance door. The church no longer serves the university but since 1979 has served Paris' Portuguese community. Saupique's composition for the tympanum is a Christ in Majesty surrounded by the four "Doctors of the church"  Saints Ambrose,  Augustine of Hippo,  Jerome and Pope Gregory I known as Gregory the Great. Around the church entrance Saupique also executed 12 bas-reliefs on 12 panels these depicting:-

1. Charlemagne and Alcuin

2. St Bernard L 3. Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas

4. St Bonaventure

5. St Ignatius and St Francois Xavier

6. Frederic Ozanam

7. St Louis and Robert de Sorbon

8. Suger

9. Hugh of Saint Victor

10.Jean Gerson

11. St Francois de Sales and Jean-Jacques Olier

12. Jean Baptiste Henri Lacordaire

and around these panels are larger reliefs depicting 8 scenes from Jesus' life, four on each side: the Annonciation, the Visitation, the Nativity, the Presentation in the Temple the last supper, he garden of olives, Jesus before Pontius Pilate and the crucifixion. Further bas-reliefs celebrate the churches benefactors with depictions of Marguerite Lebaudy with St George and St Marguerite, Pierre Lebaudy with St Peter and St Michael and an angel and various musical instruments. Finally Saupique carved 4 huge winged angels which stand on each corner of the bell tower. For the same church Saupique executed a Sacre-Coeur.

Signy-l'Abbaye War Memorial

Saupique was the sculptor of this memorial  

Lycee Henri IV War Memorial

This school is located in the rue Clovis in Paris' 5th arrondissement. The limestone memorial dedicated to the ex-pupils of the school who died in the 1914-1918 war was erected in 1921.

Montmirail War Memorial

The architects of this 1922 memorial to the dead of 1914-1918 were Fernand Gallot and Eugene Salle. Saupique's sculpture was first shown at the 1922 Salon de la Societe des Artistes Francais. At the rear of the memorial is a bas-relief depicting a griefing woman.

Memorial de la France Combattante

This memorial is located at Suresnes.  It was at Mont Valerien that the Germans shot more than a thousand resistance fighters and hostages between 1940 and 1944 and as part of this memorial are 16 allegorical reliefs in bronze by various sculptors these referring to various acts of heroism during the Second World war. Saupique's bronze refers to the Casabiance submarine which escaped from the German occupied Toulon harbor on 27 November 1942 and became a symbol of the Free French Naval Forces (FNFL). He depicts a man struggling against an octopus.

Meymac War Memorial

The adjudicating committee established to organize Meymac's war memorial received three maquettes from Saupique and chose the work entitled "Le semeur de lauriers" in which a soldier places a sprig of laurel on the grave of a dead comrade.

The Langres War Memorial

Known also as the "monument du Souvenir", the memorial stands in Langres' place de Verdun. executed in the art-deco style, the memorial consists of a base which is inscribed with the names of the men of Langres who died fighting for France in the two World Wars. On this base Saupique's sculpture depicts 4 large calibre mortars between which are bas-reliefs depicting scenes from 1914-1918. At each end are allegorical statues  One represents history and clutches to her chest a book containing descriptions of the events the memorial covers whilst the other represents the river Marne recalling the September 1914 battle fought in the river area. At the very top of the memorial a figure representing France herself holds a dead soldier wrapped in a shroud. The monument is of Euville stone, was inaugurated in 1922, and was the joint work of Saupique and Aristide Rousaud.

The Leclerc monument in Strasbourg

Saupique's work on this monument dates to 1951. It celebrates the . La 2eme Division Blindee's liberation of 23 November 1944 a liberation with Leclerc had promised in 1941. The monument also carries Leclerc's words at Koufra on 1 March 1941

and is also inscribed

The "Calvaire des Marins" in Boulogne-sur-Mer

As a tribute to all the Boulogne-sur-Mer sailors killed in the war a Calvary was erected in 1947 and called the "Calvaire des Marins". Saupique sculpted the figure of Christ involved, this cast in bronze.

Design drawings

The Musee du Louvre departement des Arts graphiques hold several of Saupique's drawings including "Femme voilee, dont les mains tiennent le sexe d'un homme", "Femme nue, assise, de face", "Etude pour un Christ en Croix" and "Homme caressant une femme".