This incomplete sketch of an armless torso--a fragmentary image of a fragment--can be identified with some certainty as a copy after the upper half of the
Hermes Richelieu, a well-known Lysippean statue in the Louvre, seen from the right side. No other armless antique statue or torso in the Louvre corresponds as closely to Cézanne's drawing, nor was any as famous--and he invariably chose the most famous works of antiquity. The problem with this identification is precisely the missing right arm, which is indeed missing today but at some time in the mid-nineteenth century had been restored (see Froehner, Willhelm.
Notice de la sculpture antique du Musée National du Louvre. Paris, 1869, no. 177). Just when it was removed, neither the later Louvre catalogues (Héron de Villefosse, Antoine.
Musée National du Louvre, Catalogue sommaire des marbres antiques. Paris, 1896, no. 573; Michon, Etienne.
Musée National du Louvre, Catalogue sommaire des marbres antiques. Paris, 1918, no. 573) nor the conservation file on the work indicates; but it was presumably after about 1890, since Fürtwangler (1893; see 1895 ed.; Fürtwangler, Adolf.
Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture. London, 1895, pp. 289-290) implies that the arm was still present. Hence, Cézanne's copy, probably made about that time, may well be the earliest record of the statues present condition. Theodore Reff, from
Paul Cézanne: Two Sketchbooks (1989), p. 114.