Leon Leyritz

Léon Albert Marie Leyritz, generally known as Léon Leyritz, was born on 7 January 1888 in Paris. He trained first at the Ecole municipale Bernard Palissy in Paris, then became a pupil of the sculptor Jean-Paul Aube. From 1906 he studied under Antonin Mercie at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Paris, and in 1914 he won the Prix Chenavard, a student prize awarded at that school.

Leyritz worked across painting, sculpture, and decorative commissions. He was a member of the Salon from 1912 and exhibited at the Salon d'Automne from 1923 and the Salon des Artistes Decorateurs from 1926. In Paris he showed at Galerie Druet in 1920 and again in 1928, at Galerie Bernheim-Jeune in December 1920, and at Galerie Mars-Antony in Caen in June 1921. In the 1920s he began using Lap, a synthetic marble-effect material, in decorative sculpture, work that culminated in the fronton of the Palais de l'Elegance at the 1937 Exposition internationale des Arts et Techniques in Paris, for which sources credit him with a gold medal among several medals received across his career.

He is most frequently remembered in biographical accounts for his close friendship with the composer Maurice Ravel, of whom he made several portrait busts. Leon Leyritz died on 26 March 1976 in Frejus, France.

There is little independent critical literature on Leyritz available in accessible sources, and no verbatim, attributable quotes from named critics in major outlets could be confirmed for this profile. What recurs across biographical and auction-catalogue notes is his association with Maurice Ravel and his role in popularizing Lap as a decorative sculptural material in the Art Deco period, particularly through the 1937 Palais de l'Elegance commission. His reputation rests more on documented Salon activity, prizes, and decorative commissions than on a body of published art criticism.

Leyritz's market is thin and largely regional. Auction aggregator MutualArt records roughly 44 to 60 works by the artist that have come to auction over time, mostly decorative sculpture, busts, and faience figures sold through French regional houses such as Boisgirard Antonini, Oger-Blanchet, and Oise Encheres, alongside occasional appearances at Christie's and Heritage Auctions. The one documented public estimate available, for a faience figure at Oger-Blanchet, was EUR 100 to 150, and a confirmed, sourced all-time record price, work, and sale date could not be established from available public records as of this profile's date. Realized-price archives at some of these houses are not fully published online, so a higher, unlisted sale cannot be ruled out, but none can currently be documented.

There is no catalogue raisonne for Leyritz and no current gallery or estate representation could be identified as of 2026; verification of works generally relies on the signature "L. Leyritz" or "LEYRITZ" and on auction-house cataloguing rather than a foundation or estate authority. Because the market is thin, provenance and correct attribution matter more than for artists with deep sale histories, and buyers should take care not to confuse this artist with unrelated people who share the Leyritz or Leyson surname in non-art contexts. Given the absence of a documented top-tier auction result, collectors should treat any single sale price as a data point from a small and irregularly published market rather than as evidence of a broader trend.