After Charles-Antoine Bridan, France, 19th century, a boy playing with a bird and a girl crying with a nest, a pair of patinated bronzes By Charles-Antoine Bridan (1730-1805), France, 19th century BOY PLAYING WITH A BIRD GIRL CRYING WITH A NEST pair of patinated bronze sculptures on circular marble base, h. 74 cm; mounted on diinto wood columns imitating marble with gilded bronze band at top, 109x36x36 cm Comparative literature A. Laing, A Bird in the Hand , in A. Gonzalez-Palacios (ed.), Anthology of Fine Arts. La Scultura , vol. II, Turin 1996, pp. 154-165 This fascinating pair of bronzes follows the models of French sculptor Charles-Antoine Bridan. While the child holds a small dove in his hands, which seems to have a small sheet of paper between its legs, probably with a message, the girl holds an empty nest in her left hand, and her face is rather sullen, perhaps because the bird has been taken from its nest. The first marble versions of Bridan were made for Cardinal de Luynes in 1759, and a terracotta version from the sculptor's studio is in the Musée des Beaux Arts in Chartres. The fortune that this subject met with is testified by the many reproductions in bronze and marble, made for example by Pierre-Philippe Thomire in France (a bronze pair of his is preserved today at the Musée de Camondo in Paris (Inv. CAM 325), but also in Italy by Francesco Righetti and Carlo Albacini.