FRENCH, SECOND HALF 18TH CENTURY

The image depicted here, of a young woman responding to the attention of her dog, follows a compositional format favoured in France in the mid to late 18th century. In this instance, the dog represents loyalty, a common association recognised since at least the renaissance. However, artists such as Jean-Baptiste Pigalle (1714-1785) often used the combination of a naked or semi-naked standing female figure leaning down to attend to a dog, cherub or - as in the case of Pigalle's La Moissoneuse of 1774 - lamb, as a device that allowed them to display their skill at representing interaction, contrasting textures and the female nude form. The present marble group may be the portrait of a woman whose steadfastness was being extolled, or it may be a more general allegory of loyalty.