The Dreamer, Mary Buchanan, 1910
Mary Buchanan

The Dreamer

1910 · Statuette · 30 × 9.5 cm

May one see it?

Yes, receiving visitors

Victoria and Albert Museum

London, United Kingdom

RoomSculpture, Room 21, The Dorothy and Michael Hintze Galleries

On public display.

Checked
In this state since
Source
The museum

About the sculpture

This statuette of a seated woman is by Scottish artist Mary Buchanan. Buchanan trained at Paisley School of Design and at Glasgow School of Art. This work is signed on the integral base 'M Buchanan/ Paris 1910', indicating she produced it while in Paris. She spent several years there, working in the studios of Antoine Bourdelle and Ossip Zadkine.

The fluid surface, and pensive form of the figure echoes some of Rodin's oeuvre, and also recalls the Belgian sculptor Constantin Meunier. From 1911 to 1931 Buchanan showed her work at numerous exhibitions in London (notably the Royal Academy), Paisley, Glasgow and Edinburgh. She also exhibited at the Paris Salon. In addition to small bronze figures, Buchanan sculpted figures and heads in wood and marble.

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Another cast of the same statuette, titled "La rêveuse" (the dreamer) is at the City Art Center collection in Edinburgh. Buchanan also exhibited a cast under the title 'The Dreamer' at the Paisley Art Institute in 1911.

Victoria and Albert Museum

Particulars

Accession number
A.9-2015

What it shows

In the catalog

Sources

In the same room · Sculpture, Room 21, The Dorothy and Michael Hintze Galleries, Victoria and Albert Museum

Museum page

On the same theme · Paris

All works on the theme