Auguste Rodin

Catalogue de l'exposition organisée au Palais de Tau du 7 avril au 30 novembre 2011. En 300 photographies inédites d'un superbe noir et blanc, Gérard Rondeau raconte la Cathédrale de Reims. Ce monument de l'art gothique devient ici l'alcôve où l'on se raconte des histoires : histoires de saints, histoires de bêtes, histoires de créatures fabuleuses qui hantent ce lieu huit fois centenaire. Le magnifique texte de Rodin, écrit en 1914, qui l'accompagne offre en contrepoint une réflexion poétique et philosophique sur cette oeuvre majestueuse, l'architecture et l'art. Une pérégrination au fil du temps et de l'histoire, empreinte de spiritualité et de magie, de beauté.

Catalog; includes biographical and critical notes.

Study of Rodin and his place in traditional and modern art.

Rodin and Dance: The Essence of Movement' is the first serious study of Rodin's late sculptural series known as the Dance Movements. Exploring the artist's fascination with dance and bodies in extreme acrobatic poses, the exhibition and accompanying catalogue give an account of Rodin's passion for new forms of dance - from South-Asian dances to the music hall and the avant garde - which began appearing on the French stage around 1900. Rodin made hundreds of drawings and watercolours of dancers. From about 1911 he also gave sculptural expression to this fascination with dancers' bodies and movements in creating the Dance Movements, a series of small clay figure studies (each approx. 30 cm in height) that stretch and twist in unsettling ways. These leaping, turning figures in terracotta and plaster were found in the artist's studio after his death and were not exhibited during Rodin's lifetime or known beyond his close circle. Presented alongside the associated drawings and photographs of some of the dancers, they show a new side to Rodin's art, in which he pushed the boundaries of sculpture, expressing themes of flight and gravity. This exhibition catalogue aims to become the authoritative reference for Rodin's Dance Movements, comprising essays from leading scholars in the field of sculpture. It will include an introductory essay on the history of the bronze casting of the Dance Movements and the critical fortune of the series, an essay on the dancers Rodin admired, and an extensive technical essay. The Catalogue will comprise detailed entries on the works in the exhibition and new technical information on the drawings. Exhibition: The Courtauld Gallery, London, UK (20.10.2016-22.01.2017).

For the first time in a museum exhibition and hence, in this catalogue the groundbreaking work of a great innovator of late-nineteenth-century sculpture encounters the influential work from a protagonist of twentieth-century abstract sculpture: Auguste Rodin meets Hans (Jean) Arp. Both artists are characterized by their unique artistic innovations and the joy of experimentation; both strongly influenced their eras and have lost nothing of their topicality to this day. As sculptural milestones, the creations of Rodin and Arp illustrate in a vivid and exemplary way fundamental aspects in the development of modern sculpture. Rodin's pioneering ideas and new artistic horizons for sculpture were taken up by Arp and fascinatingly developed, reinterpreted, or contrasted. Indeed, both oeuvres exhibit numerous artistic affinities and points of reference, which become a particularly revealing visual experience in this clever juxtaposition. Exhibition: Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel, Switzerland (31.01. - 16.05.2021) / Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck, Germany (26.06. - 14.11.2021).

"Les grands artistes procèdent comme la nature compose, et non pas comme l'anatomie décrit. Ils ne sculptent pas tel muscle, tel nerf, tel os pour lui-même ; c'est l'ensemble qu'ils visent et qu'ils expriment ; c'est par larges plans que leur œuvre vibre dans la lumière ou entre dans l'ombre". -- 4ème de couverture.

Summary:"Auguste Rodin rose from humble origins to become one of the most influential sculptors of all time. Regarded during his life as a Michelangelo of the modern age, Rodin mirrored the multiple facets of the human condition through the lifelike quality of the figures he portrayed, and challenged existing notions of form by considering details as finished works in a variety of different media. The indisputable influence of such masterpieces as The Thinker, Eternal Idol, The Kiss and The Burghers of Calais still reverberates today, almost one hundred years after Rodin's death." "In 1996 Jennifer Gough-Cooper's interest in photography was sparked by a chance visit to the Musee Rodin in Paris. There, in spacious rooms with high ceilings, Rodin's sculpture inhabits its own environment; light streams in from grand windows, breathing life into the stone. Jennifer Gough-Cooper's photographs capture qualities in the sculpture that are often not immediately apparent, revealing soft impressionist forms with a painterly quality."--Jacket