Louis Marcel BOTINELLY (1883-1962) Presumed portrait of the philosopher Henri Joly (1839-1925) Marble bust Signed "LOVIS BOTINELLY H. 90 cm H. 74 cm excluding base LJ Minor accidents, dust and dirt Related literature -Laurent Noet, Louis Botinelly, sculpteur provençal : catalogue raisonné, Paris, Mare & Martin, 2006 We would like to thank Mr Laurent Noet, a specialist in the artist, for suggesting this identification of the model. Born into a family of stonemasons from the Basses-Alpes region who settled in Marseille in 1894, Louis Bottinelly began his apprenticeship in the family workshop. Aspiring to a career in statuary, he enrolled at the École des Beaux-Arts in Marseille in 1900 and won a travel scholarship to Italy. On his return, he joined Jules Coutan's studio at the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris, before becoming his practitioner and then his collaborator. In the aftermath of the First World War, Louis Bottinelly, disappointed by his lacklustre success in the capital, returned to Marseilles, where he was officially commissioned to design several war memorials. Since his early years of training, Botinelly had specialised in sculpted portraits, in particular those of his close friends and the Marseilles intelligentsia.