.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
This work will be included in the forthcoming Auguste Rodin, Catalogue critique de l'oeuvre sculpté currently being prepared by the Comité Rodin under the archive number 2005V729B.
Executed for La porte de l'Enfer, Désespoir appears on the upper left door panel, turned inward among the other nymphs, underneath the falling winged figure and left of the serpent. (A.E. Elsen, op cit., p. 258). Although the figure of Désespoir is not mentioned in Dante, Rodin imagined it and other beings he created for La porte de l'Enfer to be "shades belonging to different circles of Dante's Hell." (ibid, p. 259). Rodin composed the contorted forms of his shades by observing models' poses as well as the more physical movements of acrobats. In the present work, one can perceive the tension and energy exuding from the supple figure. The sculptor expresses the emotional turmoil of the figure through his graphic depiction of its straining muscles.
The first owner of this sculpture was Jules Mastbaum (1872-1926), a major figure in the early American film industry and one of Philadelphia's leading philanthropists. In 1922, as he approached his fiftieth year, he commissioned Albert Rosenthal to purchase works of art on his behalf in Europe. During one of his own trips to Paris, Mr. Mastbaum acquired his first small bronze sculpture by Rodin, a purchase that triggered a lasting passion for works of this great sculptor, who had died less than six years before. Mr. Mastbaum quickly transformed his private interest into a public project, and conceived the idea of establishing a museum in Philadelphia solely devoted to the works of Rodin, thus establishing an American counterpart to the Musée Rodin in Paris.
From 1924 to 1926, Mr. Mastbaum acquired casts of all the works in the Musée Rodin collection. He also was instrumental in casting the first bronze versions of the La porte de l'Enfer, which had existed only in a plaster version when the sculptor died. The first cast went to the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia and the second one went to the Musée Rodin in Paris.
The present lot is one which Mr. Mastbaum collected in the final years of his life, and is now being sold by one of his descendants.
Executed for La porte de l'Enfer, Désespoir appears on the upper left door panel, turned inward among the other nymphs, underneath the falling winged figure and left of the serpent. (A.E. Elsen, op cit., p. 258). Although the figure of Désespoir is not mentioned in Dante, Rodin imagined it and other beings he created for La porte de l'Enfer to be "shades belonging to different circles of Dante's Hell." (ibid, p. 259). Rodin composed the contorted forms of his shades by observing models' poses as well as the more physical movements of acrobats. In the present work, one can perceive the tension and energy exuding from the supple figure. The sculptor expresses the emotional turmoil of the figure through his graphic depiction of its straining muscles.
The first owner of this sculpture was Jules Mastbaum (1872-1926), a major figure in the early American film industry and one of Philadelphia's leading philanthropists. In 1922, as he approached his fiftieth year, he commissioned Albert Rosenthal to purchase works of art on his behalf in Europe. During one of his own trips to Paris, Mr. Mastbaum acquired his first small bronze sculpture by Rodin, a purchase that triggered a lasting passion for works of this great sculptor, who had died less than six years before. Mr. Mastbaum quickly transformed his private interest into a public project, and conceived the idea of establishing a museum in Philadelphia solely devoted to the works of Rodin, thus establishing an American counterpart to the Musée Rodin in Paris.
From 1924 to 1926, Mr. Mastbaum acquired casts of all the works in the Musée Rodin collection. He also was instrumental in casting the first bronze versions of the La porte de l'Enfer, which had existed only in a plaster version when the sculptor died. The first cast went to the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia and the second one went to the Musée Rodin in Paris.
The present lot is one which Mr. Mastbaum collected in the final years of his life, and is now being sold by one of his descendants.