Marie-Anne Collot
Active in: France and Russia
Biography
Born in Paris in 1748, Marie-Anne Collot was a sculptor who specialized in portrait busts. At age fifteen, she became a student of Etienne-Maurice Falconet and accompanied him to Saint Petersburg, where he was summoned by Catherine the Great for several major commissions. Through her proximity to Falconet, Collot became close to Denis Diderot.
While in Saint Petersburg, she married Falconet’s son, Pierre-Etienne. They had a daughter together before Collot returned to Paris. Following the birth of her daughter, Collot’s artistic production declined significantly. She died in Nancy in 1821.
Selected Works
Marie-Anne Collot, Bust of Princess Frederika Sophia Wilhelmina, 1782. Marble, 84 cm. Mauritshuis
Marie-Anne Collot, Bust of Stadholder William V, 1782. Marble, 79 cm. Mauritshuis
Marie-Anne Collot, Bust of Denis Diderot, c. 1768. Porcelain, 21.2 cm x 10.6 cm. British Museum, 1993,1009.1
Marie-Anne Collot, Bust of Doctor Camper, 1779. Plaster, 57 x 27 x 26 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Marie-Anne Collot, Portrait of Pierre-Étienne Falconet, 1767–68. Bronze, 53 x 26.5 x 25 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Marie-Anne Collot, Portrait of Pierre-Étienne Falconet, 1767–68. Plaster, 63 x 27 x 26 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Marie-Anne Collot, Portrait of Étienne-Maurice Falconet, 1773. Bronze, 60.5 x 28 x 25.5 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Marie-Anne Collot, Portrait of Étienne-Maurice Falconet, 1773. Plaster, 49.5 x 29 x 27 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Marie-Anne Collot, Portrait of Mary Cathcart, ca. 1768–72. Marble, 60 x 30.5 x 26 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy
Bibliography
Becker, Marie-Louise. “Le buste de Diderot de Collot à Houdon.” L’Objet d’Art 412 (2006).
Becker, Marie-Louise. “Marie Collot à Petersbourg.” In La culture française et les archives Russes. Edited by Georges Dulac. Ferney-Voltaire: Centre International d’études du XVIIIe siècle, 2004.
Becker, Marie-Louise. “Marie-Anne Collot, L’art de la terre-cuite au féminin.” L’Objet d’Art 325 (1998).
Chapman, Caroline. Eighteenth-Century Women Artists: Their Trials, Tribulations, and Triumphs. London: Unicorn, 2017.
“Collot, Marie-Anne.” Oxford Art Online. www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000018639#oao-9781884446054-e-7000018639.
Dellac, Christiane. Marie-Anne Collot: Une Sculptrice française à La Cour de Catherine II, 1748–1821. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2005.
Etoeva. Irina G. “‘Brilliant Proof of the Creative Abilities of Women’: Marie-Anne Collot in Russia.” In An Imperial Collection: Women Artists from the State Hermitage Museum. Edited by Jordana Pomeroy, et al., 77–85. Washington, DC: National Museum of Women in the Arts, 2003.
Gaze, Delia. Dictionary of Women Artists, J–Z. London and Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997.
Levey, Michael. Painting and Sculpture in France, 1700–1789. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993.
Opperman, H. N. “Marie-Anne Collot in Russia: Two Portraits.” Burlington Magazine 107 (1965): 408–15.
Pomeroy, Jordana, et al. An Imperial Collection: Women Artists from the State Hermitage Museum. Washington, DC: National Museum of Women in the Arts, 2003.
Réau, Louis. Etienne-Maurice Falconet 1716–1791. Paris: Delmotte, 1922.
Schenker, Alexander M. The Bronze Horseman: Falconet’s Monument to Peter the Great. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014.
Sterckx, M. “Collot, Marie-Anne.” Digitaal Vrouwenlexicon van Nederland. http://www.historici.nl/Onderzoek/Projecten/DVN/lemmata/data/MarieAnneCollot [2007.
Sterckx, Marjan. “Pride and Prejudice: Eighteenth-century Women Sculptors and Their Material Practices.” In Women and Material Culture, 1660–1830. Edited by Jennie Batchelor and Cora Kaplan, 86–102. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.
Valabrègue, Antony. Madame Falconet, une artiste française en Russie, 1766–1778. Paris: Librairie J. Rouam, 1898.