Death of Emile Robert

Emile Robert, one of the most valiant and remarkable artisans of wrought iron, has just died in his sixty-fifth year, in Mehun-sur-Yèvre, where he had just retired.

We can say that from a modern point of view he was truly a precursor. The admirable galaxy of ironworkers today was formed following the example of Emile Robert, this blacksmith who had true piety for his art and who served it with so much passion that he did not hesitate to dedicate part of his life and his means to the creation and maintenance in his factory of an apprenticeship school to which we owe the current renaissance of ironwork.

Emile Robert was part of the Society of Decorative Artists. He exhibited at the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts and was one of the founders of French Art. He was among the members of the Admissions Committees for the 1925 Exhibition, where his absence will be keenly felt. We can only regret that Emile Robert, who spoke of his art as an apostle, who had lavished himself on conferences and fruitful demonstrations and whose influence was so salutary, disappeared before being able to witness the definitive victory of his ideas. With him we lose one of the first and one of the best workers of the modern idea.

His works are countless. One of the best known is the gate of the Museum of Decorative Arts. We must hope that a retrospective bringing together the master's finest productions will soon allow us to pay his memory the solemn tribute due to him.