CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)
CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)
CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)
3 More
CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)
6 More
CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)

Le dieu envolé

Details
CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1864-1943)
Le dieu envolé
signed 'C. Claudel' (on the left side of the base); numbered and stamped with foundry mark '5/8 A. VALSUANI CIRE PERDUE' (on the back of the base)
bronze with green and brown patina
Height: 26 ¼ in. (66.7 cm.)
Conceived in 1894; this bronze version cast circa 1989
Provenance
François de Massary, Paris (great-nephew of the artist).
Private collection, Paris (by descent from the above); sale, Galerie Koller, Zurich, 28 November 1996, lot 3055.
Private collection, Paris.
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2007.
Literature
R.-M. Paris, The Life of Camille Claudel: Rodin's Muse and Mistress, New York, 1984, p. 233 (plaster version illustrated, p. 194, fig. 103).
R.-M. Paris and A. de La Chapelle, L'oeuvre de Camille Claudel: Catalogue raisonné, nouvelle édition revue et complétée, Paris, 1991, pp. 167-168, no. 44.1 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 168).
G. Bouté, Camille Claudel, Le miroir de la nuit: Essai sur l'art de Camille Claudel, Paris, 1995, p. 229.
R.-M. Paris, Camille Claudel, re-trouvée: Catalogue raisonné, Nouvelle édition revue et complétée, Paris, 2000, pp. 331-332 (plaster version illustrated, p. 331 and another cast illustrated, p. 332).
A. Rivière, B. Gaudichon, and D. Ghanassia, Camille Claudel: Catalogue raisonné, Nouvelle édition revue et augmentée, Paris, 2000, pp. 138-144, no. 44.11 (plaster version illustrated in color, p. 140).
R.-M. Paris and P. Cressent, Camille Claudel: Intégrale des oeuvres, Paris, 2014, p. 401, no. 191 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 400).

Lot Essay

Le dieu envolé was conceived in 1894 and derives from Claudel's most ambitious group sculpture L'âge mûr (A. Rivière, B. Gaudichon, D. Ghanassia, no. 45). Its evolution can be seen in photographs of the plasters she produced over the next six years. The first pieces show a more static pose with the model's arms folded inward, her hands held tightly against her chest and her hair coiled against the nape of her neck. The composition of L'age mur is arranged on three levels anchored by the kneeling woman, her upwardly stretching arms creating the dynamic movement to the two figures above. In an effort to make Le dieu envolé successful as an autonomous composition, Claudel made the figure more upright, her arms stretched higher and her hands close together.
The present work is one of Claudel's later versions of the theme and is cast from a plaster that was discovered in Touraine in 1986. She reduced the size of the base on which the figure kneels so that the feet extend freely and she arranged the hair so that it hangs loosely in wild serpent-like forms, its rough texture contrasting with the smoothness of the model's skin. Claudel was working on these sculptures immediately following the end of her relationship with Auguste Rodin who had been her mentor and her lover for over ten years. When she exhibited a plaster version of Le dieu envolé (fig. 1; A. Rivière, B. Gaudichon, D. Ghanassia, no. 44.4) at the Salon of 1894, Rodin recommended it to the critic Raymond Bouyer saying, "Thank you for your kindness. Since I am absent from the Champ-de-Mars, I want to ask you to report your impressions of my student Mlle Camille Claudel who ought to be one of the most successful artists with her buste of child's head and, for my preference, a woman kneeling, Le dieu envolé!" (quoted in R. Descharnes and J.-F. Chabrun, Auguste Rodin, Paris, 1967, p. 126). Other critics also commented favorably on the piece and Geoffroy wrote, "Mlle Claudel has sent a figure from a group: Le dieu envolé, a woman kneeling, her hands twisted, beautiful in its movement, her torso turning, her face raised" (quoted in A. Rivière, B. Gaudichon, D. Ghanassia, op. cit., p. 143).

More from Impressionist and Modern Art Day Sale

View All
View All