Henri Bouchard

Who was Henri Bouchard?

Henri Bouchard, was a French sculptor.

The son of a carpenter, Bouchard was born in Dijon. He was educated at the Académie Julian and in the studio of Louis-Ernest Barrias before entering the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He took the Prix de Rome in 1901. His attention turned away from models from antiquity, and towards peasants, everyday life, and ordinary workers. Bouchard himself became a professor at the Académie Julian in 1910.

In November 1941 Bouchard was one of a number of French painters and sculptors who accepted an official invitation from Joseph Goebbels for a grand tour of Nazi Germany. Others who accepted the invitation were Charles Despiau, Paul Landowski, André Dunoyer de Segonzac, and Fauve artists Kees van Dongen, Maurice de Vlaminck, and André Derain. On his return Bouchard had kind words about the status accorded artists in Nazi Germany. Upon Liberation, in 1944, Bouchard was suspended from his professorship, branded a collaborator and ostracized by many former supporters. He died in Paris.

The Musée Bouchard in Paris was opened in 1962 and closed in 2007, at the sculptor's former studio at 25 rue de l'Yvette. Its collections, including a large figure of Apollo displayed at the Palais de Chaillot, plus over a thousand other works such as bronze casts, stone sculptures, and original plaster works, have been transferred to the Musée de La Piscine in Roubaix. According to the museum's web site, a reconstruction of the studio will open in 2010.