click photo for full-size imagephoto by Donald KinneyWhoopie !I'm a brand new member in ABC Wednesday -- and here's my "T"...
That's Rodin's Thinker, one of about 18 bronze castings -- this one, originally owned by Alma Spreckles, wife of the wealthy sugar baron, in the courtyard of San Francisco's Legion of Honor.
Of all the works by Rodin, the most famous one is unquestionably the great Thinker. It was modelled in 1880-1882 for The Gates of Hell, and exhibited in its original size (H. 71.5 cm) in Copenhagen in 1888. It was enlarged in 1902 and exhibited in this form at the Salon of 1904 where it aroused strong reactions from the press. It was on this occasion that Gabriel Mourey, editor of the magazine Les Arts de la vie, launched a subscription for a bronze "offered to the people of Paris" to erase the affront caused by the refusal of the statue of Balzac in 1898.
The Thinker was the first work by Rodin to be erected in a public place. It was inaugurated in front of the Pantheon on 21 April 1906 during an intense political and social crises which turned this sculpture into a socialist symbol. In 1922, using as a pretext that the statue created an obstacle during ceremonies, it was transported, with its pedestal, to the garden of the Hôtel Biron which had by then become the Rodin Museum. Another example was placed over the tomb of Rodin in Meudon. source:
http://www.musee-rodin.fr/senf2-e.htm If you're interested I've also got two Thinkers up
on today's edition of
The Daily Duo.
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announcing my newly (re)re-designed collection:
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