AUGUSTE RODIN (1840-1917)

VARIOUS PROPERTIES

Details

AUGUSTE RODIN (1840-1917)

La petite martyre
signed, numbered and inscribed on the back 'A. Rodin no. 5 © by Musée Rodin .1965.Georges Rudier.Fondeur. Paris.'--bronze with brown and green patina
Length: 23¾in. (60.3cm.)
Original plaster version executed in 1885; this bronze version cast in 1965, number five in an edition of 12

Provenance

Musée Rodin, Paris
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, New York, Nov. 17, 1983, lot 114

Literature

G. Grappe, Catalogue du Musée Rodin, Paris, 1944, p. 141 (another cast illustrated, p. 65; titled La martyre chrétienne)
A. E. Elsen, Rodin, New York, 1963, p. 151 (large version illustrated, p. 153)
R. Descharnes and J.-F. Chabrun, Auguste Rodin, Lausanne, 1967, p. 78 (plaster version illustrated)
I. Jianou and C. Goldscheider, Rodin, Paris, 1967, p. 91
J. L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, pp. 186-192, no. 18 (large version illustrated, p. 187, fig. 18; related versions illustrated, pp. 189 and 191, figs. 18-3 and 18-6)

Lot Essay

This figure was first executed for The Gates of Hell, where it appears near the bottom of the left panel, partially obscured by drapery, with wings added and holding a wheel. The head and shoulders are repeated elsewhere in The Gates. Once removed from its original context, however, the figure gives the appearance of having fallen from a great height. Rodin's conception of martyrdom is not religious; instead, he is expressing the pain and suffering of romantic love. This positioning of the limbs and body, with the addition of wings, is seen again in the Fall of Icarus, circa 1895.