rodin - Royal Academy of Arts

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While Rodin said that there was ‘no scheme of illustration or intended moral purpose’, his work expresses a view of the spiritual state of his time and conforms with his belief that works of art ‘say everything that one can say about man and the world. Besides, they make us understand that there is something else that one cannot know.’ It was Rilke who said that Rodin’s art was ‘to help a time whose misfortune was that all its conflicts lay in the invisible.’ After four years of intense work on The Gates it became clear that the French Government was uncertain whether to build the museum that The Gates would have adorned. A completion date receded into the distance and Rodin, who was averse to finishing anything, may have been relieved. More work was done between 1887 and 1889 for a possible showing at the Exposition in honour of the centenary of the Revolution, and judging from comments by visitors to the studio and contemporary photographs, the major artistic decisions had been taken by that date. In fact the first public showing of a plaster cast of The Gates did not take place until Rodin’s 1900 exhibition and then without many of the free-standing and high-relief figures.The first bronze cast was made in 1926, by the director of the Rodin Museum. Cat. 95 Faced with the seven-metre-high The Gates, we find it hard to take in such a structure in its entirety, let alone appreciate much of the detail. Nevertheless, Rodin has orchestrated his vast canvas in ways that help us follow his composition. Starting in the tympanum, dominated by The Thinker, the movement is horizontal, from the figures on the left awaiting judgement to those on the right who have been judged. Crouching Woman is tucked in just to the left of The Thinker, tilted sideways, with her gaze directed at the Falling Man, that extraordinary figure that plunges us into the maelstrom of swirling bodies that make up the main doors. Here movement is downwards and diagonal and takes us to some of the major figure groupings such as Ugolino and his sons on the left-hand door, and below them Rodin’s revised representation of Paolo and Francesca, following his decision not to use The Kiss. In the two pilasters the sense of movement is upwards, with figures struggling to escape their fate. At the top right we find Crouching Woman born aloft by a revised version of Falling Man. Originally called The Rape, this combination of figures became known as Je Suis Belle after the first line of a Baudelaire poem:‘I am beautiful as a dream of stone; but not maternal.’ Much of the rhythm of the figure compositions of The Gates comes from the contrast between figures contracted into themselves and those stretched out, grasping for something external. In the two doors, how does Rodin’s use of the empty spaces help us read the composition of figures? How has Rodin used shadow and highlight, recession and projection in the different parts of The Gates? ‘The Thinker in his austere nudity, in his pensive force, is at the same time a wild Adam, implacable Dante, and merciful Virgil … but he is above all The Ancestor, the first man, naive and without conscience, bending over that which he will engender.’ OCTAVE MIRBEAU, 1918 Cat. 95 The Gates of Hell, c.1890 Bronze, cast by Alexis Rudier 680 x 400 x 85 cm Kunsthaus Zürich, 1949/22. Acquired in 1947 Photo © 2006 Kunsthaus Zürich. All rights reserved. ‘For him, the position of the human body could not be reduced to a few types. Rather they seemed to be infinite, all giving rise to new ones through the decomposition and recomposition of movements, multiplying in fleeting aspects each time the body shifts.’ GUSTAVE GEFFROY, 1889 9
10 Cat. 132 Pierre de Wissant, Monumental Nude, 1886 Bronze 193 x 115 x 95 cm Kunstverein Winterthur. Presented on the 100th anniversary of the Kunstverein Winterthur by Schweizerische Bankgesellschaft AG, J.J Rieter & Cie, Gebrüder Sulzer AG, Schweizerische Unfallversicherungsgesellschaft Winterthur, 1948 Photo © Kunstmuseum Winterthur ‘His right arm is raised, bent, vacillating. His hand opens in the air as though to let something go, as one gives freedom to a bird.This gesture is symbolic of a departure from all uncertainty, from a happiness that has not yet been, from a grief that will now wait in vain … a monument for all who have died young.’ RAINER MARIA RILKE, 1903 RODIN’S STUDIO Rodin employed assistants to make moulds and multiple plaster casts of his clay originals. Using these to alter, recombine or cut up, Rodin continued to refine his ideas. In later years specialist craftsmen, using a compass like tool, would scale up figures that needed to be enlarged to life size, arriving at a finished plaster version that became the ‘master’ for a bronze cast, or marble carving if a client was prepared to pay for one. Much of this work was undertaken by quite well-known sculptors like Antoine Bourdelle and Victor Peter in their own studios. In the nineteenth century, sculpture was largely a reproductive art and the distinction between ‘original’ and ‘copy’ only became relevant when the casting or carving failed to live up to the original plaster. Occasionally Rodin approved large editions in different sizes of a popular work. Foundries produced four different-sized versions of The Kiss, based on the enlarged marble version, making over 300 copies, some of dubious quality and completely lacking the subtlety of unfolding drama present in the plaster version (cat. 25). After Rodin’s death, the Rodin Museum assumed responsibility for all casts made from plaster originals. THE BURGHERS OF CALAIS In 1884 the city of Calais decided to commemorate the heroism of Eustache de St Pierre, a leading citizen and the first of six volunteers who agreed to sacrifice their lives to lift the siege that the English king, Edward III, had laid against the city in 1346. Jean Froissart, who served Edward’s French wife, described in his Chronicle Eustache de St Pierre’s response to the king’s demand for hostages:‘great mischief it should be, to suffer to die such people as be in this town … when there is means to save them … wherefore, to save them I will be the first to put my life in jeopardy.’ Sensing that a group sculpture would provide more variety of posture, movement, gesture and emotional response, Rodin prepared a maquette with all six burghers included. Acknowledging that ‘a heroic conception’ was needed, he may also have felt that a group portrait would encourage a communal response more in line with Republican ideals. After the presentation of a second maquette it was clear that the committee in charge of the project had other ideas.‘This is not how we visualised our illustrious fellow-citizens.Their dejected attitude militates against our beliefs.’What they wanted was a more conventional ‘pyramid’-shaped monument that would raise Eustache de St Pierre above his companions to create a more positive impression. Rodin rejected their criticisms and continued working on a series of individual studies of each burgher. It was common nineteenth-century practice to make nude figures to establish the physical validity of a chosen pose before going on to the clothed version.‘You will see that it is what one does not see which is the principal thing’ was Rodin’s justification for the enormous amount of work involved. He started working at a third life-size and scaled up his figures as he became satisfied. Separate studies of heads, hands and 11
Page 1 and 2: This guide is given out free to tea
Page 3 and 4: 2 ‘What is modelling? The very pr
Page 5: 6 Cat. 80 Crouching Woman, c.1881-8
Page 9 and 10: 14 Cat. 143 Balzac, Study of Nude
Page 11 and 12: 18 became a way of sustaining the e

rodin - Royal Academy of Arts

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