Barbedienne's Bronze Statues

In No Exit, Garcin compares the mysterious bronze ornament in the room to a Barbedienne statue, and as we discussed in class, Sartre is referring to a French metalworker who produced many miniature metal statues. Barbedienne lived from 1810 to 1892 and founded the Barbedienne Foundry in 1838. Working with Achille Collas, they developed methods to produce bronze miniature versions of famous larger statues, which were then sold as ornaments or decorations. They also produced a wide variety of other metal products in their foundry, which grew relatively large, and started to make reproductions of statues made by contemporary sculptors like Auguste Rodin. By the 1860's, the foundry was successful and employed about 300 workers. During the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, production of statues was interrupted by metal shortages, but Barbedienne produced cannons for the French army. Below are some pictures of Barbedienne statues that I found online. Also, I found sites where statues produced by Barbedienne's foundry can be purchased. Some of them are pretty expensive, but others aren't too bad, so for just a couple of hundred dollars you could own a piece of French metalworking history.