Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917)

Tête de Balzac

Details

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917)
Tête de Balzac
signed 'A. Rodin' (on the right side of the neck)
wax
8¼ in. (21 cm.) high
Executed in 1892

Provenance

Madame J. Danthon; Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 24 May 1933, lot 64.
Anon. sale; Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 8 December 1958, lot 64.
Marcel and Liliane Pollak Collection, by whom acquired from the above sale.

Literature

A. E. Elsen, Rodin, New York, 1963, p. 93 (illustrated p. 91).
J. L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, no. 72-76-4, p. 433 (illustrated p. 437).

Exhibited

New York, Museum of Modern Art, Auguste Rodin, 1963, no. 11; this exhibition later travelled to San Francisco, California Palace of the Legion of Honor (illustrated).

Sale room notice

Please note that there is a small damage in the hair toward the back of Balzac's head.

Lot Essay

"In the wax head in the Pollak collection, one senses that Rodin was truly inspired by working from a living model. The features work together, flowing over a firm cranial structure; for instance, the ridge of the right cheek begins back near where the ear would be and continues until it merges with the nostrils and the profile. It is one of the sensuous studies of the series, for flesh has been given both weight and mobility. The face with its symmetry of brows and jowls operates with an incessant fluidity against the implied stability of the cube formed by the entire head. The man is alive with a masculine alertness coupled with an air of subtly detached knowing" (J.L. Tancock, loc. cit.).

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