Coutan, Jules-Felix

(Geboren: Paris, 22 Sept 1848; Gestorben: Paris, 23 Feb 1939). French sculptor and designer. He was a pupil of Pierre-Jules Cavelier at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, and in 1872 won the Prix de Rome for his statue Ajax Struck down while Defying the Gods, spending the years 1872/6 at the Academie de France in Rome. In 1876 he sent his first submission to the Paris Salon, and from 1880 he was involved in many projects for the sculptural decoration of public buildings in Paris, including the Palais de Justice, the Hotel de Ville (herald in 14th-century dress, bronze, 1885), the Bibliotheque Nationale (Calligraphy, marble, 1893) and the Opera-Comique (caryatids, 1899). His bronze relief of Eagle Hunters for the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris (plaster version, 1900; Paris, Mus. D'Orsay), is an example of the fin-de-siecle neo-Baroque style.