This silver medal by Chaplain depicts on the obverse Félix Faure, who was President of the French Republic from 1895-1899.

On the reverse / back is a draped female figure holding a flag to the left on which are a bee-hive and the trunk of an olive. In the background is a man ploughing and beyond is shown a harbour with shipping.

Chaplain (1839-1909) was a french medallist and sculptor. He entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1857, where he studied sculpture under François Jouffroy and medals under Eugène Oudiné. In 1863 he won the Prix de Rome for medal-engraving and worked in Rome from 1864 to 1868. He exhibited regularly at the Salon from 1863, receiving numerous awards. In 1881 his status as the leading French medallist was recognized by his election to the Académie des Beaux-Arts. His appointment as Art Director of the Sèvres Manufactory in 1896 and as a Commander of the Légion d’honneur in 1900 crowned a career that had been immensely successful in transforming the public perception of medallic art.

Chaplain changed public taste by moving away from the established tradition by which medallic portraits and reverse compositions emerged from a completely flat field bounded by a raised circular rim. Instead, using much lighter patinas than had been fashionable earlier in the 19th century, he incorporated the field into the composition, using it not as a neutral background but as the pictorial space in which the event or portrait sitter was situated.