Auguste Rodin
Yesterday you saw how the casting of bronze sculptures is done on the How Is A Sculpture Made? post. Today I want to show you who made them, namely one of the most famous bronze sculptors of the nineteenth century.
The French artist Auguste Rodin was considered one of the most important sculptors in his time for bringing the art back after it had taken a backstage importance to the public. At around that time sculpture was largely for decoration only, but he succeeded in turning the art into a form of expression. His attention to detail to human anatomy and his great skill have given us a mastery of human portrayal in sculpture which to this day has not been surpassed.
Like many of the best artists in history, Rodin was born into the lower class and had a rough and tumble early career, barely making ends meet. For over twenty years he performed menial sculpting tasks just to pay the bills. There is a sculpture of a head at the Philadelphia Rodin Museum with the back of it missing, due to the artist not being able to afford heat, thus causing the clay to break off in the freezing cold. He kept trying to get somewhere but suffered rejection after rejection.
Finally his big break came when he escaped from Paris, thus liberating him from academic art. He moved to Italy, where he got a healthy dose of some of the fine sculptures and statuary there. It was there where he was inspired by the works of Michelangelo Bounarotti, particularly Dying Slave, and created his first major work, The Age of Bronze. This statue had caused controversy because it was so lifelike that critics said he had cast a mold of a live model. This helped his rise to fame. In 1880 the statue was purchased by the State.
Soon after Rodin received other commissions by the State to include the monumental Gates of Hell. This project would obsess the artist for the rest of his life, and it would never be fully completed. Many of the figures on the Gates were reproduced in greater size, including The Kiss, and the famous Thinker.
Another great work by Rodin is the Burghers of Calais. The story goes that when the French city of Calais was besieged by Edward III in the Hundred Years War, the whole town was ordered to be slaughtered. An agreement was made however that the townspeople would be spared if six of the prominent citizens offered their heads instead. So six volunteered to save the population, but were pardon when the Queen convinced Edward to let them live. Rodin was commissioned to commemorate these six heroes. His sculpture shows the men with ropes around their necks, holding the keys to the city, separate from each other and walking in a circle, uneasy about their fates. The statue weighs two tons, and is meant to be placed at ground level so the viewers can walk around it and "penetrate to the heart of the subject."
These statues, as well as the Gates themselves have been reproduced by the artist himself numerous times and can now be seen in Philadelphia, Paris, and many other places across the globe. There are at least 60 Thinkers known. If you're ever in Philadelphia and make it to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, don't forget to stop by the Rodin museum just up the street. It's the largest and most important Rodin collection outside of Paris, and has all the sculptures I talked about above.
Thinker
Yesterday you saw how the casting of bronze sculptures is done on the How Is A Sculpture Made? post. Today I want to show you who made them, namely one of the most famous bronze sculptors of the nineteenth century.
The French artist Auguste Rodin was considered one of the most important sculptors in his time for bringing the art back after it had taken a backstage importance to the public. At around that time sculpture was largely for decoration only, but he succeeded in turning the art into a form of expression. His attention to detail to human anatomy and his great skill have given us a mastery of human portrayal in sculpture which to this day has not been surpassed.
Like many of the best artists in history, Rodin was born into the lower class and had a rough and tumble early career, barely making ends meet. For over twenty years he performed menial sculpting tasks just to pay the bills. There is a sculpture of a head at the Philadelphia Rodin Museum with the back of it missing, due to the artist not being able to afford heat, thus causing the clay to break off in the freezing cold. He kept trying to get somewhere but suffered rejection after rejection.
Finally his big break came when he escaped from Paris, thus liberating him from academic art. He moved to Italy, where he got a healthy dose of some of the fine sculptures and statuary there. It was there where he was inspired by the works of Michelangelo Bounarotti, particularly Dying Slave, and created his first major work, The Age of Bronze. This statue had caused controversy because it was so lifelike that critics said he had cast a mold of a live model. This helped his rise to fame. In 1880 the statue was purchased by the State.
Soon after Rodin received other commissions by the State to include the monumental Gates of Hell. This project would obsess the artist for the rest of his life, and it would never be fully completed. Many of the figures on the Gates were reproduced in greater size, including The Kiss, and the famous Thinker.
Another great work by Rodin is the Burghers of Calais. The story goes that when the French city of Calais was besieged by Edward III in the Hundred Years War, the whole town was ordered to be slaughtered. An agreement was made however that the townspeople would be spared if six of the prominent citizens offered their heads instead. So six volunteered to save the population, but were pardon when the Queen convinced Edward to let them live. Rodin was commissioned to commemorate these six heroes. His sculpture shows the men with ropes around their necks, holding the keys to the city, separate from each other and walking in a circle, uneasy about their fates. The statue weighs two tons, and is meant to be placed at ground level so the viewers can walk around it and "penetrate to the heart of the subject."
These statues, as well as the Gates themselves have been reproduced by the artist himself numerous times and can now be seen in Philadelphia, Paris, and many other places across the globe. There are at least 60 Thinkers known. If you're ever in Philadelphia and make it to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, don't forget to stop by the Rodin museum just up the street. It's the largest and most important Rodin collection outside of Paris, and has all the sculptures I talked about above.
Thinker
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