SEGOFFIN Victor (1867-1925)

Victor Joseph Jean Ambroise Ségoffin was born in Toulouse in 1867. He died in the same city in 1925. His name as a French sculptor and medalist is Victor Ségoffin.

After high school, he was admitted to the School of Fine Arts in Toulouse. In 1887, he became an orphan. He then enlisted in the army. He took classes at the National School of Decorative Arts in Paris. The student artist entered the School of Fine Arts in Paris in 1888. 

In 1895 he won the second Grand Prix de Rome, in 1896 the first second Grand Prix de Rome. In 1987, the first Grand Prix de Rome was obtained for his plaster Orpheus losing for the second time Eurydice, dragged again by Mercury into the infernal regions. Ségoffin exhibited at the Salon des artistes français between 1890 and 1923, and participated in the Universal Exhibition of 1900. He was a bronze medalist there. From 1897 to 1901, the artist was a resident at the Villa Medici in Rome. In 1920, he became the head of the women's sculpture workshop at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. In 1922, after his exemplary career, the Toulouse sculptor was crowned with the tie of an officer of the Legion of Honor.

His art is influenced by François Rude, Auguste Rodin and especially Alexandre Falguière, representative of the Toulouse school. Ségoffin specializes in bronze and marble busts. In these works he used lessons of realistic modeling learned from Barrias, developing a faithful rendering of the envelope of the models. He knew how to recreate the attitude that marks a personality.

The sculptor is also interested in allegorical and mythological subjects. He responded to numerous public commissions, including the Sacred Dance and the Profane or Warrior Dance, intended for the Élysée Palace, others for the Panthéon, the Luxembourg Gardens, the decoration of the Louvre. Certain busts such as those Harpignies, Ziem, Bonnatl, then entered the collections of the Luxembourg Museums.