François-Frédéric Lemot

Having briefly studied architecture at the Academy of Besançon, then having made his way to Paris on foot, the adolescent Lemot was discovered sketching a sculpture of Pierre Pujet in the park of Sceaux and taken into the atelier of Claude Dejoux, a minor Neoclassical sculptor who had trained with Guillaume Coustou the Younger.

Two years later he was recalled to participate in a competition under a committee of the National Convention for a colossal bronze sculpture of The French People in the guise of Hercules; his model was judged to be the best, however the monument was never commissioned.

[4] Lemot also created an Equestrian Monument of Louis XIV that provides the focal point of Place Bellecour, Lyon, where a street bears his name.

[6] His pupil, Louis Dupaty, obtained a Premier Grand Prix in sculpture, 1799, with his Pericles visiting Anaxagoras.

On his return from the French Academy in Rome he was named to the Institut de France, in 1816, then appointed a professor at the École des Beaux-Arts.