Camille Claudel (1864-1943)
Camille Claudel (1864-1943)

La valse

細節
Camille Claudel (1864-1943)
La valse
signed, stamped with Coubertin foundry mark and numbered 'C. Claudel I/IV' (on the front of the base)
bronze with brown patina
Height: 16¾ in. (42.5 cm.)
Conceived in 1895-1905; this bronze version cast at a later date
來源
Family of the artist.
出版
A. Rivière, L'interdite Camille Claudel 1964-1943, Paris, 1983, pp. 24-26 (plaster version illustrated, p. 27; another bronze version illustrated, p. 30).
R.-M. Paris, Camille Claudel, Paris, 1984, p. 360 (another cast illustrated, pp. 261-263).
R.-M. Paris, Camille: The Life of Camille Claudel, Rodin's Muse and Mistress, New York, 1988, pp. 21-22, 57, 85, 171, 173, 230-231, 238 (another cast illustrated, pp. 122-123, pls. 80-81).
R.-M. Paris and A. de La Chapelle, L'oeuvre de Camille Claudel, Catalogue raisonné, nouvelle édition revue et complétée, Paris, 1991, pp. 130-134 (plaster and other casts illustrated).
A. Rivière, B. Gaudichon and D. Ghanassia, Camille Claudel, Catalogue raisonné, Paris, 1996, pp. 87-88, no. 32-5 (another cast illustrated).

拍品專文

Reine-Marie Paris has confirmed the authenticity of this sculpture.

According to Reine-Marie Paris, there are three versions of La valse. In the present sculpture the man is kissing the woman's cheek, and not her neck as is depicted in the other two versions. Additionally, his hand covers the female's hand and the drapery is more accomplished in this present sculpture.

Claudel began La valse, premier version in 1892 and from her first study she created a life-sized plaster which she exhibited at the Salon of 1893. During this period Claudel was working closely with Rodin, whom she had met in 1883. She not only worked the hands and feet on some of Rodin's larger pieces but was model to many of Rodin's most important compositions, such as La pensée (1886) and L'Adieu (1882). There is even speculation that she may have helped carved some of his marbles. Rodin openly pronounced Claudel his equal as a sculptor and they persued similar themes in their work. The theme of lovers had been explored by Rodin in some of his most important compositions from this period: (La baiser (circa 1886) and L'éternel Printemps (1884). Whereas Rodin's sculptures were essentially structured on a dominant male figure, Claudel's presented a more feminine sensibility that showed greater parity between the male and female figures in La valse. The two artists also employed a similar technique that emphasized gesture, created tactile surfaces and built up forms. So intense was their relationship that the two were romantically involved for over a decade. In 1898 Claudel officially broke off their affair and went into seclusion, preciptating her eventual confinement to a sanitarium where she died in 1943.

Music was also a central inspiration in Claudel's work and the theme of La valse is reinterpreted in her later sculptures Joueuse de flute and Aveugle chantant. Her artistic circle included many contemporary musicians and she was rumored to have had an affair with composer Claude Debussy in 1890. While she destroyed many of the records about her sculptures, her brother Paul Claudel recalled that La valse called to life "the storm and the whirlwind of the dance of the two lovers, drunken with the moment and the music" (R.-M. Paris, op. cit., 1988, p. xix). The figures are entirely self-absorbed. Their intertwining forms and their precarious balance unites them in an expression of the intensity of life. Moreover, the dynamic movement of their dance is emphasized by the motion of the drapery which both encircles them and grounds them.