Nouvelles d'ici et d'ailleurs !: Rodin Centenary Exhibition in Paris !

RODIN : THE CENTENARY EXHIBITION

At the Grand Palais in Paris

22 March – 31 July 2017

#ExpoRodin

2017 marks the centenary of the death of Rodin, who died on 17 November 1917 in his studio/residence in Meudon at the age of seventy-seven.

A world-famous sculptor as of 1900, Rodin created studies that made him the inventor of assemblage, the partial figure and collage. Each generation of audiences and creators view his work in a new way, and a different Rodin is discovered with each passing decade. Far from relegating him to a bygone era, these new perspectives constantly enrich the way his art is understood.

From Rodin’s time to today, an Expressionist sensibility has flourished, one that explores a unique relationship with time, material and meaning. The sculptural mass is brought to life with its own vital energy, while the surface reveals an inner effervescence with varying degrees of impetuosity. A swell of emotions floods the uppermost layer of the material.

The exhibition is structured into three major sections: Rodin the expressionist, Rodin the experimenter, and the effects of this shockwave after 1945. Each section is broken down into three parts, which explore the artist’s creative world, the exhibitions and collectors he attracted and the ways in which numerous artists have appropriated his work, from his lifetime to the present day.

[French] 2017 célèbre le centenaire de la mort de Rodin, décédé le 17 novembre 1917 à son domicile-atelier de Meudon, à l’âge de soixante-dix-sept ans.

Sculpteur mondialement célèbre à partir de 1900, Rodin développe des recherches protéiformes qui en font l’inventeur de l’assemblage, de la figure partielle et du collage. A chaque génération, le public et les créateurs observent ce travail d’une manière nouvelle. Au fil des décennies, un Rodin différent est découvert. Loin de le rejeter dans un passé révolu, ces nouveaux regards enrichissent sans cesse la compréhension de son art.

De Rodin à aujourd’hui, une sensibilité expressionniste s’épanouit, qui explore un rapport particulier au temps, à la matière et au sens. La masse sculpturale s’anime d’une énergie vitale propre tandis que la surface laisse transparaître avec plus ou moins d’impétuosité l’effervescence intérieure. La houle des émotions affleure l’épiderme de la matière.

L’exposition est structurée en trois grandes parties : Rodin expressionniste, Rodin expérimentateur, les effets de cette onde de choc après 1945. Chaque partie développe en trois temps l’univers créatif de l’artiste, les expositions et les collectionneurs qu’il attira, et enfin les appropriations de son œuvre par de nombreux artistes, de son vivant et jusqu’à nos jours.

Rodin the expressionist

Rodin never ceased to reassert the presence of nature at the heart of his work. Nevertheless, he liberated himself from the subject in the traditional sense of the term from a very early stage. He aim was to make the bodies speak: “ The body,” he said, “is a cast that bears the imprint of our passions.”

He therefore excluded any historical or literary reference from The Burghers of Calais (Bourgeois de Calais) and The Gates of Hell (La Porte de l’Enfer), choosing instead to assert the universal dimension of the figures and group. Beyond this intentional absence of intellectual references, Rodin pushed beyond the boundaries of naturalism through the forms he created on a quest for expression.

From 1890, the master was unanimously praised as the man who brought sculpture back to life. His fame – and aura – never ceased to flourish. Young artists flocked to his studio, and in turn pushed what they had learnt there to the limit. Bourdelle, Lehmbruck and Zadkine are just three such artists who have never shied away from exaggeration, deformation or amplification of the form, while others instead retained Rodin’s dramatically expressive vision of human destiny.

Rodin the experimenter

From the 1880s and with the work produced for The Gate of Hell, Rodin accumulated hundreds of plaster casts of his clay models. His studio became agiant reservoir of forms which he constantly drew from, sculpted, took apart and recomposed. The marks of work or time were increasingly used for their aesthetic value, while figures created separately were brought together to produce new works. Seeking the sources of a rrenewed sculpture in the very process of developing form became a constant practice for Rodin. This approach, which was entirely original at the time, would go on to become extremely widespread among future generations of artists.

This recomposition also applied to Rodin’s drawings, as well as the ways in which he retouched the photographs taken of his sculptures.

Thus, in sculpture and graphic art alike, the same figures reappear ceaselessly, turned to a different angle or brought together. A new art form appeared, one of variation and series.

Rodin: the shockwave

With its major technical inventions – cars, aeroplanes, telephones, film, etc. – the late 19^th century saw a profound change in the relationship with space and time, as well as the pushing back of horizons, specifically through colonisation. From then on, Rodin sought to reformulate the sculptural tradition in a language adapted to these cultural transformations.

After the horrors of the Second World War and Holocaust, the concept of creation changed once again. An interest in the subject and figuration returned to the spotlight. A new generation of artists returned to the expression of feelings and emotions through a more sensitive form of sculpture. Disciples of Bourdelle – himself a student of Rodin – including Germaine Richier and Alberto Giacometti were at the forefront of this new direction, with their abrupt subjects, tense forms, powerful plays on shadow and light and trembling surfaces.