L'Enfant prodigue

Details

Auguste Rodin (1840-1917)
L'Enfant prodigue
signed on the top of the base 'A. Rodin', inscribed with foundry mark on the back of the base '.Alexis Rudier..Fondeur.PARIS.'
bronze with green and black patina
Height: 22in. (55.9cm.)
Original plaster version excecuted 1885-1887; this bronze version cast before 1952

Provenance

Rudier Family, Paris
B.C. Holland Gallery, Chicago (acquired by Steven and Ursula Schwartz, 1965)

Literature

G. Grappe, Catalogue du Musée Rodin, Paris, 1927, no. 220 (plaster version illustrated, p. 82)
A.E. Elsen, Rodin, New York, 1963, pp. 57-59 (large bronze version illustrated, p. 56)
R. Descharnes and J.-F. Chabrun, Auguste Rodin, Lausanne, 1967, p. 91 (large bronze version illustrated)
I. Jianou and C. Goldscheider, Rodin, Paris, 1967, p. 92 (plaster version illustrated, pl. 34)
J.L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976 pl. 5 (another cast illustrated, p. 45)
A.E. Elsen, In Rodin's Studio, Ithaca, 1980, pp. 168, 179 and 184

Lot Essay

Executed between 1885-1887, this sculpture is one of the first figures Rodin completed for The Gates of Hell, where it appears twice, once by itself and again as the male figure in the group Fugit amor.