Laura Dianti
By Titian
“He is, as Dante said of Virgil, ‘their guide, their master, and their friend.’”
THE THINKER
By Rodin
CHAPTER IX
MYSTERY IN ART
One morning, when I arrived at Rodin’s house at Meudon I found the master in his dressing-gown, his hair in disorder, his feet in slippers, sitting before a good wood fire, for it was November.
“It is the time of the year,” he said, “when I allow myself to be ill. All the rest of the time I have so much work, so many occupations, so many cares, that I have not a single instant to breathe. But fatigue accumulates, and though I fight stubbornly to conquer it, yet towards the end of the year I am obliged to stop work for a few days.”
Even as I listened to his words my eyes rested upon a great cross on the wall, on which hung the Christ, a figure three-quarters life-size. It was a very fine painted carving of most painful realism. The body hanging from the tree looked so dead that it could never come to life—the most complete consummation of the mysterious sacrifice.
“You admire my crucifix!” Rodin said, following my glance. “It is amazing, is it not? Its realism recalls that one in the Chapel del Santisimo Christo in Burgos—that image so moving, so terrifying, yes—so horrible—that it looks like a real human corpse. This figure of the Christ is much less brutal. See how pure and harmonious are the lines of the body and arms!”