(b Paris, 1656; d Paris, 11 Oct 1726). French sculptor. He was born into a family of joiners and sculptors, and he studied at the Acad?mie Royale, Paris, then at the Acad?mie de France in Rome from 1683 to 1686. While there he executed a free copy in marble of the Callipygian Venus (Paris, Louvre), giving it a fleshy sensuality absent from the antique original; it was later provided with a beautiful though inappropriate drapery in marble by Jean Thierry. From 1686 to 1709 Barois appears to have been employed exclusively by the B?timents du Roi. For the gardens at the ch?teau of Versailles he carved two marble terms, of Vertumnus and Pomona (in the Tuileries Gardens, Paris, since 1722), after models by Fran?ois Girardon, a marble vase for the All?e Royale and, for the chapel, a graceful statue of Faith in stone. He also worked at the Trianon, the Invalides and Marly, where he executed a virtually nude marble statue of Pomona for the Cascade Champ?tre (1706-9; Paris, Min. Affaires Etrang?res). He was admitted to the Acad?mie de St Luc in 1693, and in 1700 to the Acad?mie Royale, of which he eventually became rector. His output was not large, but his mor?eau de r?ception, the Death of Cleopatra (marble, 1700; Paris, Louvre), sums up the fluency and confidence of his best work; its easy elegance and its mastery of theatrical effects anticipate the Rococo aesthetic of the 18th century.
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