Charles Cordier (1827-1905 )Arab of el AghouatCirca 1856Bronze head model with brown patina H : 48 cm with blackened wood pedestal H : 14 cmProvenance : Family of the artist by descent. The export certificate n° 229704 of the work will be given to the buyer. Related works: - Charles Cordier, Arabe d'el Aghouat, 1856, bronze bust, H. 56 cm, Paris, Musée de l'Homme, inv. 27045-1977-201; - Charles Cordier, Arabe d'el Aghouat, 1856, bronze and marble-onyx bust, H. 72,2 cm, Paris, Musée d'Orsay, inv. RF 3598. Related literature: Laure de Margerie, Édouard Papet, Charles Cordier, 1827-1905: the other and the elsewhere, cat. exp, Paris, Musée d'Orsay, 2 February-2 May 2004, Quebec, Musée national des Beaux-arts, 10 June-6 September 2004, New York, Dahesh museum of Art, 12 October 2004-9 January 2005, Paris, Éditions de la Martinière, 2004, models listed from no. 16 to no. 30, pp. 146-148. Cordier executed this portrait during his second stay in Algeria, between April and October 1856 . He presented a bronze version at the 1857 Salon (no. 2812) and a bronze and marble-onyx version at the 1860 exhibition at the Galerie ethnographique (no. 1). In the catalogue raisonné published for the 2004 exhibition Charles Cordier, l'autre et l'ailleurs at the Musée d'Orsay, Jeannine Durand-Révillon and Laure de Margerie list eleven examples of the Arab of el Aghouat. All different, dressed in marble or marble and porphyry, they are paired with the Sudanese Negro or reunited to form the Three Great Races with the latter and the Chinese. Under n° 28 of the same catalogue the authors reproduce an old photo of Cordier's workshop where a bronze head can be seen which could be our chief model. The quality of the casting of our head is irreproachable, of a great lightness, the bronze is carefully chiselled without being too meticulous with the idea to be as close as possible to the original print and to keep a form of naturalism supporting the ethnographic purpose of the artist.