RODIN

Otago Witness, Issue 4048, 13 October 1931, Page 10

RODIN

AS I KNEW HIM.

By

Arthur Lynch.

The exhibition of Rodin’s works at the Leicester Galleries serve to give some idea of the great sculptor’s style, but after all any collection that could now be brought together, even in a large museum, would be inadequate to show forth his genius to the full (says a recent number of John o’ London’s Weekly). He was exceptionally prolific, for up to the last he worked hard, and in his later years he received some of the highest honours ever bestowed on an artist, yet Rodin was a disappointed man. What he had/really hoped to achieve was something beyond the scope of a Michelangelo. The “ Penseur ” (the “Thinker”), for example, though complete in itself, was but a small detail in hi s unfinished work, “La Forte d’Enfer ” (“ The Gate of Hell ”), and the “ Porte ” again was but a detail of what he had at least contemplated as possible. In Rodin’s view art was not expressed by a few works, even masterpieces, shown in a gallery. His wide sculptural' freseo, as he conceived it, would be in art somewhat analogous to what Balzac’s “ Comedie Humaine ” was to literature. Paris should be the museum; the planning'of the city should be formed on artistic lines; .and the adornments of art should not be extraneous pieces of fine ornamentation, but natural and integral parts of the whole design woven into it and symbolising the national life. This sounds, perhaps, unduly solemn, but was convincing enough in the manner in which I once heard hijn express it, in his slow, deep voice, in short phrases expressing the thoughts that were always with him. He had a higher conception of art, and a greater devotion to the ideals of art. than any man whom I have ever met. He seemed to me at times like the high priest of a sort oi religion of art; all this, however, without pomp, or pretence, or undue emphasis. A- A"- .. As to the man himself: Rodin was cf middle height, thick-set and powerful, broad of shoulder, and deep of chest. He looked like a Flemish type in his roughhewn vigour, and'the general appearance of a superior stone mason. With his head and beard he had an aspect like that, so well known to us, of W. G. Grace, surprisingly heavy and solid for one in whom one expects to find light graces and the fame of genius. The flame was in the eye, a small, light-blue, almost greyish eye, clear and keen, usually beaming mildly, but flashing at times. Picture a river god with a (lowing beard, wake him. and give him a chisel and hammer, fire him with inspiration, and you have Rodin. Of the many talks that I had with him I could almost build up a treatise ■m art. as he saw it, but to give some intimate view of the man may better help to contradict the many false’legends that have grown up about him. It has Iwen said, for instance, that he never posed his models. That is not true. He took great pains to pose them. Onee. I remember, he told me with great admiration of a Japanese actress Who could hold her pose—resting on the left foot, and with the right lc" extended—ten times as long as any of the white models. , I asked him if she was beautiful. ” Yes,” he replied, seriously, “if yon take it that beauty is not to'be confined to any type, not even the Grecian. Anv type is beautiful where the full and harmonious development of that type is expressed.”

But though he posed his models, he used to watch them closely when he told them they could rest, and he often got his best effects as the model, losing self-consciousness, was just about to sit. Rodin, with crayon in hand and a large cartoon paper before him, would catch the line and make a note of it with an exaggerated sweep that was perhaps intelligible to himself alone. It has been said that he took Mr Bernard Shaw as the model for his “ Penseur,” but that is absurd. Perhaps it will suffice to say that he produced the famous figure before he set eves on our inimitable humorist. Further, strange though it might seem here, Shaw made no remarkable impression on Rodin, and the bust of Shaw is not among the. sculptor’s great works. Once in taking me round his studio he pointed out Shaw’s head as that of an Englishman, but he had forgotten the name! ’ . That is not surprising, for Rodin was indifferent to external reputations, and he was more ignorant than most intelligent men of politics, of literature, or philosophic thought. He saw everythin" by the light of his artistic symbols.

To return to the “ Penseur.” It is not G.B.S. in bronze; it is not even an intellectual type. Rodin’s meaning has been misconceived. What he intended to represent was the rude, primitive man mured, strengthened physically hv hard toil, who, resting a while after his labours, feels a strange stirrin" of thoughts and questions as to What lies above and envelopes our daily life. The “Penseur” brings to my mind also Rodin’s contempt, mingling with hatred and fear, of the “Academicians.” They had from the first stood in opposition to his work; they had scorned him

and caused the rejection of statues by the Salon, and they had compelled him to pass long years in sheer poverty when he was glad to get a stone mason’s job to make a living. All that had gone into his bones, and even when he had become famous he feared that they were " undermining” him all the time. There was a fault in the pedestal of the “ Penseur,” he told me, in its original position in front of the Pantheon. In reply to my suggestion that he should rectify it, he said that if he took it down the academicians would contrive that it should never be put up again! It was a study in drama to hear Rod>n utter in a tone of contempt and of haunting dread the word “Academician! ”

On that day—l mention this to illustrate his modesty and ease in company —we had invited to lunch with Rodin a writer well known in France for his ilelightful “ Legend of the Eagle,” Georges d’Esparbes. Rodin waited for d’Esparbes to go in first. i What! ” cried d’Esparbes in horror, “ the drummer boy to precede the fieldmarshall!” — Rodin laughed as if these trifles did not matter among friends. On another occasion he received a cheque of a thousand guineas for the bust of an American millionaire. It was not unwelcome at the time, but Rodin spent it in buying a little mutilated antique Greek Cupid; and, as he set this on his table and feasted his eyes on it, I could see that it meant more to him than all the lucre on earth. The guiding principle of all Rodin’s work might be said to be: The Greek ideal of form, infused with life and movement. Towards the end of bis career Jie "as more and more impressed ■with Egyptian sculpture, and indeed inclined at times to place it above the Greek. The explanation of that feeling I take, it to be that he had more and more in view that vast scope of art, mentioned at the beginning, which embraced also the architecture of the city. He loved equally the bold and triumphant expressions of power and the beauty of the Greeks. Hence, balancing his Athlete” and “ L’Homme Qni Maiehe (“The Walker”), we may see close by in the Leicester Galleries his * Barner” (“The Kiss”). This is a theme to which he often recurred, and there is a still finer “ Raiser ” in Paris.

Of his busts, one of the most notable is that of Clemenceau, but as with nearly all Rodin’s great pieces this has a history. Clemenceau had given some lectures in Bennos Ayres, and his Argentine admirers, wishing to make him a presentation, commissioned Rodin to do a bust of the great man. Rodin did sexeial, but the one he chose erred bv being too good! It gave the very mail in life and soul; but as it brought out too clearly his Mongol features, and at fiist sight looked ugly, Clemenceau refused to accept it. One of the copies is at the Leicester Galleries.

It was Rodin’s fate, even at the height of his fame to be misappreciated. His Balzac was rejected by the Committee of the French Society of Authors, and a statue by Falguiere was taken in its place. Rodin showed no resentment. He piaised. the work of Falguiere and invited him to dinner. Falguicre’s Balzac is good, but it will not bear comparison with Rodin’s; there is all the difference between talent and genius. He used to declaie that the test of understanding Ins work wa s the Balzac. Here I be" to enrol myself modestly among his lieges.

Finally, the “Burghers of Calais” Ihe treatment of this work in London caused him deep chagrin; but the story of this tragi comedy deserves separat’e treatment. Rodin’s influence has not ceased with his death. The French sculptor Bourdelle, the Serbian. Mestrovic, the Norwegian, Vigeland, and, to •i less degree, the Englishman, Epstein, have derived inspiration from his art and his example. That influence will grow with the years.