Rodin, Auguste, << roh DAN, oh GOOST >> (1840-1917), a French sculptor, is often considered the greatest sculptor of the 1800’s. Rodin created an enormous number of sculptures of the human figure. Many of them have a great deal of emotional intensity, and explore a wide range of human passions. The inner feelings of his figures are expressed through a vigorous sense of movement and by gestures that emphasize different parts of the body. Many of his figures are incomplete or fragmentary. These works consist of just a torso, a head, or hands.
Loading the player...Burghers of Calais by Auguste Rodin
Rodin was primarily a modeler, preferring to work with clay and wax rather than to carve in stone. After he created the original model, his assistants would translate it into marble or bronze. Inspired by the Renaissance sculptor Michelangelo, Rodin’s marble figures are often beautifully smooth and finished, emerging from parts of the marble that are often very rough. The surfaces of his bronze works combine a thorough understanding of anatomy with a rough texture that allows light and shadow to enliven the work.
Rodin was born in Paris on Nov. 12, 1840. He did not win public recognition for many years, and had to earn his living designing popular sculpture and ornament for commercial firms. Indifference and misunderstanding greeted his first exhibits, but appreciation for his work gradually spread. By 1880, his genius began to be more widely appreciated and by the 1900’s he was world famous.
In 1880, Rodin was commissioned by the French government to create a large sculptural door for the Museum of Decorative Art in Paris. The subject was the “Inferno” from Dante’s Divine Comedy. The door was never finished, but Rodin did many figures for it. Later he developed many of them as independent sculptures. The best known include The Thinker and The Kiss. Rodin’s most important later works include the monumental group The Burghers of Calais and the monument to Balzac. Rodin died on Nov. 17, 1917.
