A History of Sculpture

by Ernest Henry Short

Truth to tell, Rodin owes his success to no one except himself. He is essentially the sculptor of modern individualism in its most intense form.

A few years later Rodin engaged himself as a workman in the studio of the fashionable sculptor, Carrier-Belleuse, prior to emigrating to Brussels, as assistant to the Belgium sculptor, Van Rasbourg. Thirteen years were spent in these employments. It was not until Rodin returned to Paris, aged thirty-one, that his career as an independent sculptor commenced. In 1877, he sent the famous male nude, “The Age of Brass,” to the Salon. The story of its reception is well known. The jury, astonished at its realism, admitted the works. But so perfect did they consider its modelling, that they refused to believe that the sculptor had not taken a cast from the life. Fortunately, a friend was at hand—M. Turquet, of the Ministry of Fine Arts—who secured the statue for the Luxembourg collection. The struggle continued until 1880, when officialdom finally decided to approve the purchase of the “Age of Brass” and withdrew an entirely unjustifiable charge. In the same year, the State purchased the “[St. John Baptist],” a fine bronze replica of which can be seen at South Kensington Museum.

At the age of forty, when many men have abandoned all hope, Rodin found the path to fame open. The long struggle over the “Age of Brass” had brought notoriety, no small matter in an age of advertisement. Events soon proved that it had done much more. A dogmatic revolutionary like Rodin only required to realize how utterly his ideals clashed with those of his rivals to cling to them with fourfold energy. The treble rejection by the École des Beaux Arts and the cruel struggle with the Salon Jury turned a sculptor who would only have been a mediocre academician into a reactionary of genius.

Rodin’s reputation as a fighter has led many to believe that his work is essentially uncouth. His technical powers matured slowly, but to-day no French sculptor is more richly endowed. When he pleases, Rodin can render, say, the velvety softness of a woman’s flesh with an ease and delicate grace that any sculptor might envy. A beautiful example of this side of Rodin’s genius is furnished by the “Fallen Danaid” (1888).

The girl has fallen, in a paroxysm of grief, on a rocky stretch—the very roughness of the setting offering a beautiful contrast to the soft modelling of the limbs. The face is half buried. The dishevelled hair trails amid the broken fragments of the water jar. As we said of Carpeaux’s “Flora,” the “Danaid” is a subject which might occupy the chisel of the most academic sculptor. But there is not a suggestion of an earlier imagination in Rodin’s rendering. He has simply felt the thing afresh and expressed himself in the manner which seemed most suitable.

The “Danaid” represents one side of Rodin’s genius, but perhaps the life-work of the sculptor can be most readily appreciated from some account of the mysterious “Gate of Hell,” which looms so largely in all biographical notices of the sculptor.

The commission for the “Gate of Hell” (the Porte de l’Enfer) dates from 1880, and was a direct consequence of the settlement of the controversy which arose out of the “Age of Brass.” The original idea was to provide an entrance to the projected Musée des Arts Décoratifs, which, if it did not vie with, would at least recall Lorenzo Ghiberti’s “[Gate of Paradise],” in the Baptistery at Florence. The original site for the Musée in the Cour des Comptes has, however, since been utilized for a railway station, and the French Government has, accordingly, never required the completion of its contract. For twenty-seven years the “Gate of Hell” has stood in Rodin’s studio in the Rue de l’Université—subject to constant modification and elaboration.

No one who has ever been absorbed in a particular art will find it difficult to realize the consequences of this chance. The “Gate of Hell” has become the store-house from which Rodin draws his sculptural inspiration. All his thoughts and emotions which call for sculptural expression seem to spend themselves upon it. Rodin’s philosophy is a mixture of Dante and Baudelaire. Consequently, the “Gate of Hell” has practically become a twentieth-century paraphrase of the teachings of the two men, expressed in terms of sculpture. Some of Rodin’s ideas, naturally, fail to find a convenient niche in the gate. Others prove capable of translation into individual works on a larger scale.

For instance, the first idea for the well-known group in the Luxembourg, “[The Kiss]” (Le Baiser), was designed for the Porte de l’Enfer, and showed Paolo and Francesca falling hellward, in the very throes of their guilty passion. In the larger marble, the idea has been purged of its Dantesque character, and Rodin gives us a picture of the eternal beauty of true passion. Primarily, “[The Kiss]” is a study in vigorous manhood, though Rodin is no less successful in his treatment of the softer form of the woman. Neither is reminiscent of the model. But while Rodin has idealized the figures, he has never reached the false idealism which spells convention.

But the real worth of “[The Kiss]” does not lie in its technical achievement, but in the pure, human emotion with which the work is suffused. Note—it is only a minor point—the hand on the woman’s thigh, quivering with passion. Compare it with the unresponsive fingers of the other hand which rest upon the stony rock.