Auguste Rodin

Auguste Rodin is the most important sculptor in France of the second half of the 19^th century. Born in Paris he was in close contact with the French Impressionists. Like them, he explored the influence of light and colour on natural objects and his sculptures were regularly the source of new scandals. His extremely novel approach unsettled the general public as he no longer sought to create an exact copy of nature. His sculptures took on revolutionary shapes that, for example, highlight the optical effect of sunlight on human skin. This culminated in the thoroughly irregular surface structure of his bronzes for instance. Carl Burckhardt (1878–1923), a Swiss painter and sculptor, said of Rodin’s work: “The starkness of the positive natural shapes frozen more of less in plaster, contrasted with how one senses or sees such images, is surprising even in the case of a sculpture of modest artistic value.” Seen in connection with Impressionism, Rodin is therefore considered the creator of the painterly in sculpture.

Rodin was represented by the Galerie Alfred Flechtheim in Germany. Rodin and Flechtheim also shared a passionate interest in boxing. In an article in ‘Querschnitt’ in 1921, Flechtheim recalled that “Rodin hardly ever misses a fight.” Flechtheim already included works by Rodin – especially watercolours – in the exhibition at the opening of his gallery in 1913 in Düsseldorf. He gathered a whole mass of works in winter 1929 for the exhibition in his Berlin gallery ‘Seit Cézanne in Paris’. It may well have been that this also included watercolours from Flechtheim’s private collection. He had acquired these, in addition to “many other things”, from Félix Féneon (1861–1944), the director of the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune in Paris between 1906 and 1925. Flechtheim assembled watercolours, 80 in total, in May 1930 too. He also showed a number of sculptures and drawings at at least eight other exhibitions from 1913–1932.