Rodin: A Life of Creativity and Controversy

Join Dr. Kahren Jones Arbitman for a look at the life of Auguste Rodin: an artist whose extraordinary creativity, vast technical prowess, and outsized personality earned him a place among the world’s greatest sculptors.

Auguste Rodin: an artist whose extraordinary creativity, vast technical prowess, and outsized personality earned him a place among the world’s greatest sculptors. Despite his natural abilities, Rodin’s world-wide success came neither instantly nor easily. Alongside the accolades came a lifetime of controversy starting early when critics accused him of casting a nude male sculpture directly from his model’s body. Even decades later at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair—his renown firmly established—Rodin’s nudes were deemed so shocking that overseers hid them behind a curtain, available for viewing only upon request. Despite decades of rejection from official French academies and shortsighted patrons, Rodin never compromised his vision, thus gifting the world a body of work that continues to resonate with modern audiences.

Controversy continues to follow Rodin long after his death. By its very nature, sculpting in metal allows for multiple castings. In the case of Rodin, this has led to serious questions about what constitutes an "original" by the artist. Strict laws exist, which if followed assiduously, will stamp a work as legitimate. If not, Caveat Emptor.