Fervently fixed in stone.

• Position: Focus on Art

"THE PASSIONS of Jean Baptiste Carpeaux" is a major retrospective that will explore the life and work of the exceptionally gifted, deeply tormented sculptor who defined the heady atmosphere of the Second Empire in France (1852-71). The first full-scale exhibition in 38 years devoted to Carpeaux, it will feature about 160 works, including sculptures, paintings, and drawings, which will be organized around the major projects that the artist undertook during his brief and stormy career.

Carpeaux is best known today for a single masterpiece, "Ugolino and His Sons," yet he was a multifaceted and prolific artist. A sculptor of emotion, both grand and intimate, he was drawn to extremes from Michelangelo to Jean-Antoine Watteau while retaining respectful admiration for his peers in French sculpture.

A precursor of Auguste Rodin and a host of other early modern sculptors, he imbued his work with strong movement and visceral drive. He strove for anatomical realism in all media, but especially in his marble sculptures and busts, which seem to capture flesh and blood in stone.

This exhibition will evoke the ambitious public monuments he created through groupings of drawings and vibrant preliminary clay models and will trace the evolution of such masterpieces in marble as "Ugolino and his Sons" and the "Prince Imperial with his Dog Nero."

Carpeaux sketched his surroundings constantly and had a genius for portraiture. Ravishing portraits of celebrities and friends, as well as wrenching ones of himself and his wife Amelie, will be on view along with poignant drawings of an astonishing variety of subjects and techniques. His dramatic, highly independent paintings, barely known during his lifetime, also will be on display.

The exhibit will probe overlooked works to reveal not only the darkness and despair of his troubled existence, but his cruelty towards his wife. Carpeaux, who was plagued by serious physical maladies and violent mood swings throughout his life, died at age 48 in 1875. He was, however, extraordinarily productive, compiling a vast body of work sustained at the highest level of quality.

Carpeaux was born in 1827 in Valenciennes, France (also the birthplace of Watteau), the son of a mason and a lacemaker. He was accepted into the renowned Ecole des BeauxArts in 1844 where he worked fervently to win the prestigious Prix de Rome. Carpeaux finally won the prize for sculpture in 1854, then in 1856 moved to Rome, where he found inspiration in...