Auguste Rodin (1840-1917)

La grande ombre

Details

Auguste Rodin (1840-1917)
Rodin, A.
La grande ombre
signed 'A. Rodin' (on the right side of the base); inscribed with foundry mark 'Alexis Rudier Fondeur Paris' (on the back of the base)
bronze with green patina
Height: 76 in. (193 cm.); Length: 39.3/8 in. (100 cm.)
Original version conceived circa 1880; this bronze version cast circa 1925-1927

Provenance

Muse Rodin, Paris.
Eugne Rudier, Paris (acquired from the above as a payment in kind from the above circa 1927).
Mrs. Eugne Rudier, Paris (by descent from the above, 1952).
Raymond Subes, France (acquired from the above estate, 1957).
By descent from the estate of the above to the present owner.

Literature

ed., Muse Rodin, Catalogue sommaire des Oeuvres d'Auguste Rodin, Paris, 1926, no. 171 (another cast illustrated, p. 31).
G. Grappe, Catalogue du Muse Rodin, Paris, 1944, nos. 57-59.
J. Charbonneaux, Les Sculptures de Rodin, Paris, 1949, pl. 12 (another cast illustrated).
"Maillol, Renoir et Rodin taient au dernier rendez-vous," Paris-Match, Paris, 5 July 1952 (illustrated).
"Au Vsinet dans un Cadre Naturel, 20 Statues de Matres, Le Figaro, Paris, 4 February 1954 (illustrated).
A.E. Elsen, Rodin, New York, 1963, p. 49.
R. Descharnes and J.-F. Chabrun, Auguste Rodin, Lausanne, 1967, p. 67.
I. Jianou and C. Goldscheider, Rodin, Paris, 1967, p. 88 (another cast illustrated, p. 19).
L. Goldscheider, Rodin Sculptures, London, 1970, p. 117, no. 12 (another cast illustrated, pl. 12).
J.L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, pp. 129-130, and 135 (another cast illustrated, pp. 131-132, nos. 5 and 5-1).
M.L. Levkoff, Rodin in his Time, Los Angeles and London, 1994,
pp. 58-59.

Exhibited

Paris, Muse du Petit Palais, Matres de l'Art Indpendant, no. 13.

Lot Essay

No work more directly expresses Rodin's intense admiration for Michelangelo than La grande ombre. The heroic figure canon, the contorted, almost violent pose and the idealized facial type all are due to close study of the Italian sculptor's works. Writing from Italy in 1875, five years before modeling the present piece, Rodin said, "I have been studying Michelangelo since my first hour in Florence and I think that the great magician is revealing some of his secrets to me.... I have made sketches at home in the evening, not after his works, but after all the scaffoldings, the methods I have invented to understand him; I think I have succeeded in giving to them some of that nameless quality that only he knows how to give" (quoted in J. Tancock, op. cit., p. 122). In modeling the present work, Rodin was especially inspired by Michelangelo's unfinished marble sculptures of the Apostles (Galleria dell'Academia, Florence) and by his Victory (Palazzo della Signoria, Florence).

Between 1881 and 1886, Rodin decided to place three casts of La grande ombre, each lacking the right hand, at the top of the Porte de l'Infer. The figures represent the souls of Dante's deceased countrymen. When first exhibited, they were shown pointing to a plaque with the inscription "Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch'intrate." This inscription appears over the entrance to Hell in Dante's inferno.

Eugne Rudier received two casts of La grande ombre from the Muse Rodin between 1927 and 1930 as payments for debts. One of the casts, the present work, remained with the Rudier family, the other cast was erected on Eugne Rudier's tomb in Le Vsinet upon his death in 1952.

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