AUGUSTE RODIN

(1840-1917)

Minotaure, version aux cornes courtes

Footnotes

This work will be included in the forthcoming Auguste Rodin catalogue critique de l'oeuvre sculpté, currently being prepared by the Comité Auguste Rodin at Galerie Brame & Lorenceau under the direction of Jérôme Le Blay.

Provenance
William Turner Dannat Collection, New York (acquired from the artist circa 1894).
M. B. Coureau Collection, London.
Sale: Christie's, London, June 29, 1920, lot 4.
M. Knoedler & Co., New York, no. 15078 (acquired at the above sale).
David Kirkpatrick Bruce Collection, Washington D.C. (acquired from the above on March 5, 1928).
M. Knoedler & Co., Paris, no. A1036b (acquired from the above in June 1935).
Acquired by the present owner by 1975.

Literature
L. Maillard, Études sur quelques artistes originaux. Auguste Rodin, statuaire, Paris, 1899, p. 33 (marble version illustrated).
P. Gsell, Auguste Rodin, l'art entretiens réunis, Paris, 1912, p. 215 (marble version illustrated; titled 'Le faune et la nymphe').
R. Rilke, Auguste Rodin, Leipzig, 1920, pl. 28 (another cast illustrated).
G. Grappe, Catalogue du Musée Rodin, Paris, 1927, no. 207 (marble version illustrated p. 79).
C. Goldscheider, Rodin, sa vie, son oeuvre, son héritage, Paris, 1962, p. 77 (another cast illustrated).
J.L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, no. 41 (another cast and marble version illustrated p. 271 & p. 273).
J. de Caso & P.B. Sanders, Rodin's Sculpture: A Critical Study of the Spreckels Collection, San Francisco, 1977, no. 14 (another cast illustrated p. 106; titled 'Faun and Nymph').
C. Lampert, Rodin, Sculpture & Drawings, London, 1986, no. 119 (another cast illustrated p. 88, pl. 156).
A.E. Elsen, Rodin's Art: The Rodin Collection of Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, New York, 2003, no. 157 (another cast illustrated pp. 510-511).
A. Le Normand-Romain, The Bronzes of Rodin, Catalogue of Works in the Musée Rodin, vol. II, Paris, 2007, no. S.770 (another cast and marble version illustrated p. 523 & p. 525).



The present bronze version of Rodin's Minotaure is an exceptionally rare example, created by the Griffoul & Lorge foundry on behalf of Rodin, around 1887, using the sand-casting technique.

The first owner of the present work was the American painter, William Turner Dannat, who lived in Paris between 1880-1890. Within the Musée Rodin archives, there are elements of correspondence between the two artists from July 1894, wherein a painting of a female portrait by Dannat was received in exchange for Rodin's marble Fatigue. Dannat also acquired a bronze of the L'Éternel Printemps before 1894, and it is possible he acquired this bronze cast of the Minotaur on the same occasion.

An avid reader of Ovid's 'Metamorphoses,' Rodin would have been fully acquainted with the Minotaur's legend when the present work was conceived between 1883 and 1885. The present work depicts the moment in which a sacrificial maiden falls into the clutches of the Minotaur. Rodin's masterful composition enables him to depict the female figure in sensual detail while simultaneously depicting the highly developed musculature of the male figure's back. The sculptor regularly explored themes of sexuality through his work. Drawing upon the examples of Clodion, the eighteenth-century decorator, and Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse, it is likely that Rodin utilized mythological themes such as the legend of the Minotaur in his more erotic compositions in order to elude the otherwise critical eye of the censor. Rodin created numerous sculptural pairings of figures in his art, but Albert Elsen suggests this highly erotic and sexually charged work differs from the many other pairings because the figures were most likely conceived and modeled together and not separately, which can also be seen as further evidence to its early date. His positioning of the figures will have most certainly contributed to its popularity.

Minotaure was very successful during Rodin's lifetime. It was widely exhibited around the turn of the century and early years of the twentieth century with the first recorded exhibition dating to 1896. As John Tancock suggests "Minotaur points to Rodin's continued enthusiasm for the art of the eighteenth century [...]. It may be for this reason that it was one of the most widely admired by early connoisseurs" (J.L. Tancock, op. cit., p. 272).