SLODTZ, René Michel or Michel Ange (1715-1764), French sculptor, was born at Paris on 29th September 1715. He passed seventeen years of his life at Rome, where he was chosen to execute a statue of St Bruno, one of the best modern works of the class in St Peter’s. He was also the sculptor of the tomb of Marquis Capponi in St John of the Florentines. Other works of his are to be seen at the church of St Louis of France and at Santa Maria della Scala. After his return to France, Slodtz, in conjunction with his brothers Sebastian and Paul, produced many decorative works in the churches of Paris, and, though much has been destroyed, his most considerable achievement—the tomb of Languet de Gergy in St Sulpice—exists at the present day. He died at Paris on 26th October 1764.

Slodtz had been, like his brothers, a member of the Academy of Painting and Sculpture, and many particulars of his life are preserved in a memoir written by Cochin, and also in a letter from the same to the Gazette Littéraire, which was reproduced by Castilhon in the Nécrologe of 1766. Slodtz’s father (1655-1726) was also a sculptor, born at Antwerp; he became a pupil of Girardon and worked mostly under him at Versailles and the Tuileries.

See C. N. Cochin, Mém. inéd., Paris, 1881; Barbet de Jouy, Sculpture moderne du Louvre, Paris, 1856; Dussieux, Artistes Français à l'Étranger, Paris, 1852.