The work of the French sculptor Antoine Coysevox (1640-1720) reflected a shift in official French taste from the relatively severe classicism of the 1660s and 1670s to the more expressive and Italianate baroque style and foreshadowed the rococo.

Antoine Coysevox was born in Lyons on Sept. 29, 1640. He studied at the Royal Academy in Paris (1657-1663). By the late 1670s he was employed at Versailles with many other sculptors engaged in the task of creating fountains and statues for the vast gardens. The artists working on this project were required to conform to the demand by the Royal Academy for a restrained, classical version of the baroque style. Although Coysevox never visited Italy, his personal taste tended to the more fluid, dramatic Italian baroque, and the garden sculpture he executed in the French classical manner is generally dull and uninspired.

During the 1680s the classicism which had dominated the...