An Artistic Innovator

Rodin and America, Influence and Adaptation, 1876 – 1936 is currently on exhibit at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University. It features the works of Rodin and the American artists he influenced. These artists include John Storrs, Gertrude Whitney, Georgia O’Keeffe, Alexander Calder, Edward Steichen and many others. His late drawings influenced John Singer Sargent’s drawings of nude figures. In addition to a wide range of Rodin’s work, the work of 42 other artists are on display, showing the influence of Rodin’s artistic innovations. This powerful exhibit gave me many things to think about but two elements particularly struck me, the setting and the idea of fragmentation.

Rodin applied to the École des Beaux-Arts three times and his application was rejected. He finally applied to a less prestigious school that trained craftsmen rather than fine artists. Yet he became the most celebrated artist of his day. Rodin is credited with several innovations: the truncation of human body, which was intensively investigated by Edward Steichen and other American photographers, the dissolution of form, a more naturalistic approach to sexual subject matter, the use of unfinished surfaces, and the addition of powerful feelings of movement in sculpture. Rodin’s work was a tipping point in America’s transition from the academic tradition to modernism.

Of all his contributions, the introduction of the fragment as a complete work affected me the most. Rainer Maria Rilke says “It is left to the artist to make out of many things one thing, and from the smallest part of a thing an entirety. “ One can communicate powerfully, spiritually, and emotionally in a fragment.

A fragment can express better a certain mood than the whole object. The exhibit starts with a large banner showing Steichen’s photograph of Rodin’s statue of Balzac. Steichen talks about the dialectic between the photographer and its subject:“The photographer not only sees – he looks and in the process of looking, insight is developed to the point where the object looks back at the photographer and together they make the photo. “ The photos I have taken are also fragments of his works, to create a dialectic between his work and my feelings.

I have seen Rodin’s sculptures in the beautiful Musée Rodin in Paris. It is an elegant hotel particulier with elaborate boiseries in a lovely garden which contains many of the famous sculptures in natural settings. However I found the setting at the Cantor a perfect atmosphere to surround his works. The modern stair case and the clean lines of the windows provide a minimalist background that frames each sculpture and enhances it, bringing out the modern aspects of his work.

The way in which the artist reaches his goal is the secret of his own existence.—Auguste Rodin

Let us get a glimpse through Rodin’s existence by seeing this exhibit. I am leading a Meetup group called Les Bons Vivants. It is for French speaking people or those who would like to be involved with French culture. We will be meeting at 2:00 pm on January 7th at the Cantor Arts Center. Please join us.