Auguste Rodin
Les Cathédrales de France [Cathedrals of France]
Introduction by Charles Morice
Paris, 1914, Libraire Armand Colin, 164 pages
Review by Francesco Mazzaferro. Part Two
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| Fig. 19) The cover of the 2010 pocket edition, by Dominique Dupuis-Labbé |
How should we interpret “Cathedrals of France” by Auguste Rodin? As a lyrical text,
according to the technique of 'prose poetry' inaugurated in the nineteenth
century by Baudelaire, Rimbaud and Mallarmé? As a travel diary? As a collection
of thoughts on art? As the notebook of a sculptor looking for inspiration in
the architectural past of provincial France? It is evident that the text was a
combination of all of this. Certainly, it matched French taste: as it has been
discussed in many posts in this blog, there has always been proximity between
art writing and poetry in France, especially in the decades of symbolism. The
only other text mentioned by Rodin was the Prayer
on the Acropolis by Ernest Renan (1823-1892) [30]. Although it was a much
shorter writing, it was also a text at the crossroads between poetry and
humanities. In many respects, Rodin wanted to express the same reverence towards
French cathedrals, repeating the same tribute which Renan, the philosopher and
historian of religions, had offered in 1881 to Greek culture, celebrating the
perfect beauty of classic Attica in a prayer in front of the Parthenon. "Before I myself disappear – Rodin wrote - I
wish at least to have told my admiration for the cathedrals. I wish to pay them
my debt of gratitude, I, who owe them so much happiness! I wish to honor these
stones, so lovingly transformed into masterpieces by humble and wise artisans;
these moldings admirably modelled like the lips of a young woman; these
beautiful lingering shadows where softness sleeps at the heart of power; these
delicate and vigorous ribs springing up toward the vault and bending down upon
the intersection of a flower, these rose windows whose magnificence was
inspired by the setting sun or the dawn” [31].
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| Fig. 20) The rose window of the main nave of Chartres Cathedral, 1194-1220 |
It was already said (see Part One) that
probably Charles Morice's hand accentuated the lyrical tones of Rodin's prose.
It seems to me, however, that any discussion on the actual paternity of the
text is quite useless: whatever the actual scope of the intervention by the poet
and critic may have been, it is to be ruled out that Rodin first drafted an
architectural treaty then transformed into a literary text against his will.
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| Fig. 21) August Rodin, table 181 in the 1915 issue of Cathedrals of France: Portal of the Church of the Abbey of Saint-Pierre d'Auxerre, between 1881 and 1884 |
The structure of Rodin’s book was not
homogeneous, it contained many repetitions and probably reflected the fact that
the texts were written down in apart years from each other. At least thirty
years divided the first voyage to northern France in 1877 to study Gothic art,
cited by Léonce Bénédite in his introduction to the second French edition of
1921, and the last trip by Rodin to Chartres (which - from internal evidence -
must have been concluded after 1906) [32]. We know that between these dates the
sculptor held several visits to cathedrals; Rodin spoke of 'pilgrimages' [33], planned
to emulate John Ruskin's journey (the latter had published in 1884 “The Bible of Amiens”, translated in
French in 1904 by Marcel Proust). Without any doubt, Rodin did not manage to
transform those notes into a coherent text, which could be autonomous from the passages
collected in previous years. The disorder of the text, moreover, has made it
impossible so far for scholars to attempt any temporal reconstruction of the
development of the artist's thought.
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| Fig. 22) The title of the French edition of John Ruskin's The Bible of Amiens, translated by Marcel Proust |
The first chapter of the Cathedrals, titled
"Initiation into the Art of the
Middle Ages", aimed at offering a general framework; the second showed
how the Romanesque and Gothic style of cathedrals were a necessary consequence
and an integral part of "French countryside". Shorter chapters (III-V) followed,
dedicated to the Romanesque style cathedrals in Étampes and Mantes. Rodin then included
chapters on Gothic cathedrals: Nevers, Amiens, Le Mans, Soissons, Reims, Laon
and Chartres (chapters IV-XII). He did not include any reference to the
Parisian churches, including Notre-Dame, a sign of Rodin's fierce adversity against
large urban environments ("Superior
works are still found in our provincial cities that are not yet internationalized"
[34]). The work ended with some observations on the ornaments included in the
cathedrals - in particular flower representations (chapter thirteenth) - and with
some thoughts (almost aphorisms) on architecture and sculpture (chapter
fourteenth). Below, I will try to highlight the most indicative topics, at
least in my view, of this text articulated in 275-pages. I will use the nice English translation by Elisabeth Chase Geissbuhler in 1965.
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| Fig. 23) The Collégiale Notre-Dame-du-Fort in Étampes, detail from a black and white postcard, 1130 to 1210 |
What can we learn
about Rodin's sculpture?
Both Léonce Bénédite in 1921 and Herbert Read
and Francis Haskell in 1965 took the view that Cathedrals of France did not only provide a description of one of
Rodin's inspirational sources (the cathedrals), but also allowed the readers to
better understand his creations. Haskell wrote that the first lines of Rodin's
text, those starting the book with a statement that seems to recall a theme
that will be repeated throughout the score of a symphony, evolving into a
thousand variations, had a programmatic value: "Principles: Cathedrals impose a sense of confidence, of assurance, of peace.
How? By their harmony [35]” The French sculptor had to explain such a bold
statement with his own conceptual categories on art: "Here a few technical considerations are needed. Harmony in living
bodies results from the counterbalancing of masses that move. A cathedral is
built on the principle of living bodies. Its concordances, its equilibrium,
exactly follow general laws according to nature’s order. (...) Everyone knows
that the human body, as it moves, changes its bearing and that equilibrium is re-established
through compensations. (...) These indications are not without importance in
relation to Cathedrals. The compensating movements, those perpetual and
unconscious gestures of life, explain the principle that architects have
applied in their flying buttresses which they needed to hold up solidly the
enormous weight of their roofs” [36].
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| Fig. 24) August Rodin, Fugit amor, 1891 |
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| Fig. 25) Flying buttresses in the Amiens Cathedral, 1220 until 1269 |
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| Fig. 26) August Rodin, The Prophetess, circa 1900 |
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| Fig. 27) Flying buttresses in the Chartres Cathedral, 1194-1220 |
Architecture and other
arts
For Rodin, architecture is the leading art, one
that, with a play of “simple and so
powerful planes” [37], can create a play of lights and shadows and thereby
great monumental effects. "Indeed
this play, this harmonious use of night and day, is the end and the means, the
very object and justification of all the arts” [38]. "The architect, as he works according to the
laws that govern light and shade and according to his own intensions, has at
his disposal only certain combinations of geometrical planes. But what immense
effects he obtains by means so slight!” [39]. In architecture "the planes (...) are of interest not only as
equilibrium and solidity; they
determine, besides, those deep shadows and beautiful blond areas that give the
building so magnificent a vesture. (...) These great shadows and great lights are carried solely by essential
planes, the only ones that count from afar, the only ones that are not thin and
weak ... And despite their power, or rather because of that power, those lines,
those planes, are simple and without ponderance. Let us not forget that power
brings forth grace; there is perversion of taste or perversion of mind in
looking for grace in weakness" [40]. The ogival arch is an example of the luminous game of
the planes: "What elegance is in
these simple and so powerful planes! Thanks to them, light and shadow react
upon one another to produce half tones, the principle of the opulent effect we
admire in these mighty structures. This effect is entirely pictorial” [41].
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| Fig. 28) Ogival arches in the Reims Cathedral, 1218 to 1299 |
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| Fig. 29) Auguste Rodin, Torso of Adele, before 1884 |
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| Fig. 30) Chartres Cathedral, detail of the Royal Portal, 1145-1150 |
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| Fig. 31) Auguste Rodin, Absolution, after 1900. Statue restored for the exhibition Kiefer-Rodin, Rodin Museum, Paris, 2017 |
It would be a mistake to think this concept
concerns only architects. Sculptors must also organize light and shade, and
ultimately act as architects: "Are
not these supreme aims of architecture also those of sculpture? The sculptor
who chooses his models from among living forms, from vegetables or animals, men
and women, is indeed admirably served by the infinite variety of all that
beauty; but this variety may also become a danger to him. He attains full
expression only by devoting his whole study to the harmonious play of light and
shade, exactly as does the architect. In the final analysis then, it is always
by light and shade that a sculptor as well as an architect shapes and models.
Sculpture is but one species in the immense genus of architecture, and we
should never speak of sculpture without subordinating it to architecture”
[42].
Death and resurrection
of cathedrals
Behind every strongly conservative thought
there is always the announcement of an expected mourning: the conviction of the
fatal proximity of the disappearance of traditional values. What type of threat,
according to Rodin, made it necessary to gather the souls of the French in
defence of their cathedrals? Why did he use a rhetorical question, when asking:
“Is no one tempted to praise you also, to
protect you, French marvels?” [43].Frankly, it is difficult to understand
it. The author carefully avoided taking position on any current political (but
also aesthetic) issue of his time, so it is impossible with today’s eyes to say
whether he referred to the hostile attitude of the republican government about
religious properties or to a general risk of loss of historical memory. And yet,
it has already been said in the first part of this post that Cathedrals of France was an expression
of a vast movement of French culture to preserve cathedrals. There was also, as
we shall see, a contradictory element that I should like to point out: Rodin
feared the death of the cathedrals, but - as we shall see – he was absolutely
contrary to their restoration.
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| Fig. 32) The Saint Julian cathedral in Le Mans (XI-XV century). This image is taken from a postcard of 1939 |
Rodin seems to be concerned above all by the
collective loss of taste by the French society: living in a modern world
equalled, to him, forgetting the old one: "But architecture no longer touches us. The rooms in which we consent to
live are without character. They are boxes crammed helter-skelter with
furniture. Everywhere the ‘Conglomeration’ style reigns. How can we understand
the profound unity of the great Gothic symphony? “ [44]
Whatever the reasons for concern, a
resurrection is possible, provided the values of the past are discovered again:
for artists "art was one of the
wings of love, and religion was the other. Art and religion give humanity all
the certainties it needs to live by and which are unknown to epochs dimmed by
indifference, that moral fog” [45].
Gothic art as the new
classic
Rodin offered readers an idea of the history of
national art that had Gothic art as its reference of origin: "For a very long while it was agreed that the
art of the Middle Ages was nonexistent. It was – let us tirelessly repeat in
order to silence that insult which throughout three centuries was ceaselessly
aimed at it – ‘barbarism’. (...) But this art is one of the majestic sides of
beauty” [46]. “Gothic art produced
the French Renaissance by deducing from clear Gothic principles their
consequences. Or to say that more accurately, the Renaissance is a Declension of
the Gothic” [47]. And the indication of Gothic art as the birthplace of
French art was confirmed by the idea of its equalization with ancient Greek
art: the cathedrals were equal to (and are perhaps superior) to the Parthenon
and to the art of Attica of the Fifth Century BC. In this pattern, the
influence of other neighbouring cultural areas (Italy, Flanders and the
Netherlands, Spain, Germany) on the development of French art was instead minimized.
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| Fig. 33) Smiling Angel, Reims Cathedral, 1218-1299 |
Any phrasing of a new founding myth (and
therefore also that of the cathedral as the birthplace of a new culture)
requires the steady exercise of a will: Rodin's rhetoric leaves no room for
interpretation: "Strength is
repugnant to the weak. Not understanding it, they do not desire it. The
cathedral was achieved slowly and passionately. The Romans brought it their
might, their logic, their serenity. The Barbarians brought it their naïve
grace, their love of life, their dreams, their imagination. From this
collaboration, which came without premeditated design, the work germinated,
modeled by time and place. The Cathedral is the image of French genius. It did
not come about by fits and starts nor in obedience to pride. It rose to
expression over a succession of centuries. And this expression throughout the
country varies with each province, and each fraction of province (...). Our
atmosphere, the air of our country, at once so sharp and so shrouded in mists,
guided our Gothic and Renaissance artists. Their art is as soft as the light of
day. The Greeks knew no other way for making their masterpieces. By the
precision of its resolve, by its knowledge of the declension of light, the
Gothic-Renaissance joins, and has no need to envy it, Greek art. Ah Renan! You
left Brittany to prostrate yourself before the Parthenon! A sculptor raised by
the Greeks comes from the Parthenon and goes to Chartres to adore the Cathedral”
[48].
Interestingly, in the same decades of the early
twentieth century, the artistic world of many European cultural areas searched
and found its legitimacy in elements of continuity with the past. If Rodin
proposed a French national art whose original impulse would come from northern
France and its cathedrals, in Germany a concept of national art imposed itself in
those years, which made the German world the natural heir of Greek-Roman
antiquity, filtered through Renaissance and Romanticism. In Italy, the
reference was obviously to the Roman culture, Renaissance and Baroque (the
latter was being rediscovered after a long period of oblivion).
Rodin saw the whole meaning of his art in the
creation of a link between Gothic art and that of his time: "For my contemporaries, I am a bridge connecting two banks, the past to the
present” [49]. However, when Cathedrals
of France was published, this reference system had already come into crisis
(and so Rodin belonged, from this point of view, to the past). In France,
Impressionism established itself as a new classical movement from which all
subsequent impulses would come (neo-Impressionism, Fauves, avant-garde, etc.)
and immediately replaced Gothic art as the original reference point for every
young artist who wanted to innovate. Although Rodin’s modernity has been the
basic thesis of the Parisian celebrations of 2017, I do not believe that Rodin
would have taken side with the avant-gardes of the early twentieth century. It
is very significant, in my opinion, that none of the contemporary artists
(including the most famous Impressionists) are ever mentioned in Cathedrals (not even Monet, with his celebrated
series of Rouen cathedrals). Rodin seemed to even realize that history is
overtaking him when he said, "I am
one of the last witnesses of a dying art” [50].
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| Fig. 34) Claude Monet, Rouen Cathedral, 1894 |
It would be then the many variations of a 'return
to order' after the First World War, to restore some of the aesthetic foundations
on which Rodin’s art was based: his sculpture regained interest because art taste
took a step back in his direction.
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| Fig. 35) Aristide Maillol, The night, 1920 |
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| Fig. 36) Arturo Martini, The sleeping, 1921 |
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| Fig. 37) Georg Kolbe, The morning, 1925 |
The French primacy
The modern reader can only be struck, and
perhaps shocked, by the frequency with which Rodin proclaimed the supremacy of
the "French race". In the
positivist categories of the nineteenth century, artistic production of a
people was seen as a racial issue, as the notion of race offered an even more
profound identity than the concept of nation: think of the masterpiece of
Hippolyte Taine (1828-1893), or his treatise on Philosophie de l’Art (1865-1882). On what other cultures was the French primacy proclaimed?
First of all, on Italy, where the artist had travelled in 1875. The discovery
of the Gothic was first of all the emancipation from Italy: "I am not traveling to Italy or elsewhere.
(...) And in fact, because I myself have changed, I find novelty in sights that
are familiar, and beauty in forms that I did not understand before” [51].
The French nature
Romanic and Gothic were style movements that had
spread across much of Europe; even in the basic unit of styles, there were however
certainly regional elements that coincided with political and linguistic areas
and were therefore interpreted in the 19th century as national characters.
Rodin, however, made a further step in a deterministic sense: he felt that
French cathedrals were the necessary and inevitable consequence of the French
landscape (la nature française), meaning all aspects (sky, light,
soil, vegetation). This was a dominant theme in his book: "The Cathedral is a synthesis of our country.
I repeat: the rocks, forests, gardens, Northern sun, all these are condensed in
this gigantic body. All of our France is in our Cathedrals, just as all of
Greece is summarised in the Parthenon” [52]. "French cathedrals are born of the French countryside” [53] (a
sentence marked in italics and repeated several times in the book, as if it
were a poetic motif). "Our air, our
sky, at once so clear and so oft, gave our artists their grace and refined
their taste” [54].
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| Fig. 38) Claude Lorrain, Judgement of Paris, 1645-1646 |
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| Fig. 39) Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot, Fishing and Haymaking -Surroundings of the City of Avray, 1865-1870 |
Contrary to what happened to many painters of
his time, the French landscape to which Rodin devoted his heart was that of
small urban centres and not Paris, a symbol of corruption by "science and industry" [55]. Only
extra-urban landscapes still owned the vitality of the paintings of Lorrain and
Corot; only villages retained modesty and balance; Rodin considered unbearable
the eclectic architectural style (he called it the " Style of Babel ", as if it were the result of the confusion
of different languages) which was spreading in
Paris [56]. Amusingly, however, when the book was published, Rodin was trying
to move from the modest "Villa des Brillants" (Villa of the Brillants) in Meudon, where he lived since 1895, to
the Hôtel Biron, a sumptuous rococo townhouse in the most elegant Parisian arrondissement, where he had occupied
all available space since 1911 for his own atelier (it is today's Rodin Museum,
with a delightful English garden).
Against the
restoration of the cathedrals
One of the most surprising themes of Cathedrals of France is Rodin's fierce
opposition to any restoration of cathedrals. He took the view that any genuine
art should not be restored, but continued. It is really difficult to understand
what he meant, probably because he himself did not have a clear idea of the
ultimate consequences of his own statements. The author referred, as best
case in the past, to situations where gothic cathedrals had been integrated
with ornamental Renaissance elements, modernizing them with moderation and without
violating and good taste. He firmly opposed any attempt to restore cathedrals
through the imitation of the original style. It is evident that Rodin was not
fond of the Cologne cathedral, concluded after a long restoration and
completion in 1880. Probably, he also abhorred Eugène Viollet-le-Duc's
(1814-1879) plans to restore and complete the cathedral of Amiens. It is
unclear what his views were about the proliferation of mediocre Neo-Gothic
parishes, which were spreading in the periphery of new urban agglomerations
everywhere in Europe. And finally, one cannot ignore a question: if a
restoration was really necessary, did margins really exist to operate tasteful
inserts in a modern and innovative style, perhaps based on cement and iron?
Cases of stylistic eclecticism, such as the Church of Saint Augustin, completed
in Paris in 1868, are still making us raise eyebrows today (and really belonged
to the " Style of Babel " that Rodin certainly repudiated).
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| Fig. 40) Jean-Baptiste-Antoine Lassus, Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Belleville Church, Paris, 1850. It was one of the first Neo-Gothic churches in France |
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| Fig. 41) Victor Baltard, Church of Saint Augustin, Paris, 1860-1871. It was an early example of nineteenth-century eclectic historicism. |
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| Fig. 42) François Jouffroy, Frieze with Christ and the Apostles, Facade of the Church of Saint Augustin, Paris, 1862 |
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| Fig. 43) Eugene Viollet-le-Duc, Project for a Concert Hall, 1864 |
Against emancipation,
against cities, against modernity
It is increasingly understood that the degree
of modernity of a polity can be measured according to the way women are
involved in the social fabric. Obviously, Rodin's texts reflected France in the
last quarter of the nineteenth century. But here are his most genuine feelings
about the matter: "Let nothing be
changed in the education of our women: they are indeed fine as they are. Even
the most beautiful Venus of antiquity was less beautiful. (...) The bearing of young women going to church
is without false modesty, the torso straight, the step firm in the peaceful
street of a small town. These are not women of fashion, not those in whose
transparent flesh, perfurmed by the most precious scents, life would fear to
show itself, where the soul hides. I speak of beings who are simple, true,
sound, and very much alive, of women predestined for joy and for sacrifice,
whom we love and cause to suffer” [57]. In short, we are close to the year
zero. We are dealing with an artist, whom I would not be hard to think of as a
reactionary male.
The virtue of French
women
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| Fig. 44) August Rodin, Eva (bronze version), 1881 |
Much has been written about Rodin's messy sentimental
life. In Cathedrals of France there was
no element that would enrich our knowledge of these events: neither in regard
to the famous relationship with his young pupil Camille Claudel (1864-1943) nor
about those with the equally young secretaries Gwen John, Claire de Choisel,
and Marcelle Tirel (who - as seen - typewrote the manuscript of Cathedrals), nor finally about the
ten-year relationship with Rose Beuret, who married the sculptor in the days
preceding his death, after giving him a son many years before. In these pages,
Rodin always talked about himself as a man who always travelled alone, all
focused on cathedrals and landscapes. And, most surprisingly, one of the
recurring themes of his travel notation was the virtue of the French girls (it
is understood, the provincial youth, and not the young ladies who were tempted
by the capital, where the vice awaited them, causing "a hideous waste of beauty” [58]).
Rodin, in his life, was probably a man very
similar to his famous fellow countryman one hundred years later: Dominique
Strauss-Kahn. The artist, now old but still sexually active, had in fact lost
all capacity to hold back his instincts. The idea that he was a romantic
seducer able to attract every woman thanks to the artist's charm should
probably be turned in the image of a man who seized every power situation to please
himself with models, students and secretaries, abusing of the authority he exercised
on them. Even his art was, in many respects, sexually explicit, and he was
often compelled to defend himself against criticism not only by conservatives
but by the artistic circles closer to him. What was therefore the significance
of many pages of the Cathedrals?
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| Fig. 45) August Rodin, Eros-low relief, no date |
Here is an example: "A little French girl seen at church [in Beaugency]. A
lily-of-the-valley in flower wearing a new dress. Sensual pleasure is as yet a
stranger to these adolescent lines. What modest grace! If this young girl knew
how to look and to see, she would recognize her portrait in all the portals of
our Gothic churches, for she is the incarnation of our style, of our art, of
our France. From my place behind her, I saw only the general outline of her
person and the downy rose of her cheek, half child, half woman. But she lifts
her head, turns away for an instant from her small book, and the profile of a
young angel appears. Here in all her charm is the young girl of the French
provinces: simplicity, integrity, tenderness, intelligence, and that smiling
calm of true innocence which is transmitted like a sweet contagion and pours
peace into the most troubled hearts. Modesty
and Moderation are the principal qualities of French womanhood. Our young girls
(far from Paris) wear those two words clearly inscribed on their foreheads, and
the modern spirit by miracle has not yet been able to rub them away"
[59].
Though I have no proof, I wonder if one of the
interpretations of the volume should not be that this was a sort of an atonement
book. Rodin almost seemed to proclaim what he wanted and was not able to be.
The inconsistencies between the lyrical tone of the book and the true life are
very widespread, as we have already said: the artist hated modernity, but run
an almost industrial artist studio, producing the same statues in different
materials and in many copies, so that he could raise his earnings; he was proud
of the modest life of French in the countryside, but shifted the centre of his
life from a rural area to a rich palace in the centre of Paris. But the most
noticeable inconsistency was that about young women: seen as strong and integer
women, able to combine beauty and character while maintaining an exemplary
moral conduct in Cathedrals, and as a territory for conquest without any hesitation in everyday life. Perhaps with Cathedrals Rodin tried to create a
double of himslef, a man very different from what he knew he was.
Eroticization of
cathedrals?
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| Fig. 46) Auguste Rodin, Ornament, no date |
There is another question, which is discussed
in the introduction by Dominique Dupuis-Labbé. In many pages Rodin referred to
the cathedrals as they had been built on the image of the female body, and showed
almost an erotic emotion vis-à-vis the buildings. Was this a case of
'eroticization' or even 'sexualization' of architecture? Let's the scholar talk:
"Is this why Rodin is full of
admiration and love in front of the beauty, strength and power of the cathedrals?
And, in fact, we have the impression of a fervent adoring ode to monuments:
Rodin burns with passion, the slightest detail fills him with joy and
admiration, he bows to the monuments. (...) Is it because ‘women perfume the
churches of their beauty?’ Rodin speaks to us of palpable arches, beautiful
shapes that give beautiful shadows, beauty that awakens the heart or revives it
to love. In his spirit, cathedrals and women are but the same thing. Rodin is
not the only one to dare this comparison. Some authors of his time go far
beyond, referring to the ogive of feminine sex, the "parvis of the
belly" or the "giant sex of my gothic portal".” [60]
As we shall see, the parallel exhibition of
Kiefer and Rodin, held this year at the Rhodes Museum, has developed these
considerations, thereby confirming the theme of the eroticization of
cathedrals.
Poetry pages
Many pages of Cathedrals had literary value,
they were examples of ‘prose poetry’ according to symbolist poetic pattern. One
of the best known passages (I have already mentioned in the first part the
positive opinion of the Nobel Prize for Literature Gerhard Hauptmann on these
pages) is where Rodin describes the Reims cathedral at night. It is a text of
several pages, of which I am only quoting the beginning.
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| Fig. 47) An interior of the Cathedral of Reims |
"Distant gleams
turn brown and blacken before certain columns. They clarify others obliquely,
feebly yet regularly.
But the depth of the
chancel and the whole left part of the nave are plunged in a thick gloom. The
effect is horrible because of the indecision of things in the lighted distance.
A whole square space is struck by stark illumination; lights flame between columns
that take on colossal proportions. And I am made to doubt this epoch and this
country by the interruptions, these conflicts of light and shadow, these four
opaque columns before me and these six others lighted farther off on the same
oblique line, and then by the night in which I am bathed and which submerges
everything. There is no softness. I have the impression of being in an immense
cavern from which Apollo will arise.
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| Fig. 48) Auguste Rodin, The Three Shadows, before 1886 |
For a very long while
I cannot define the horrible vision. I no longer recognize my religion, my
Cathedral. This is the horror of the ancient mysteries. At least so I should
suppose if no longer felt the architectural symmetry. The vaulted ceilings are
barely perceptible, braced by shadows, the ribs of the arches.
I must escape the
oppression of this effect of closing in. A guide takes me by
the hand, and I move through darkness that soars as far as the vault.
From the light beyond
them, these five columns have their oblique illumination. The ribs, the arched
ceiling beams, the ogives resemble crossed flags, like those at the Invalides.
I advance. It is an
enchanted forest. The tops of the five columns are no longer visible. The pale
lights that cross the balustrades horizontally create infernal roundelays. Here
one is in heaven by day, and in hell by night. Like Dante, we have descended
into hell.
Violent contrasts are
like those from torchlight. Ardent fire at the mouth of a tunnel spreads out in
layers. Only the columns against this flaming background are indistinctly
black. At moments a drapery appears with a red cross; the light seems to be
extinguished, but, no, it persists in a mortal immobility” [61].
Going back to the
interpretation of Cathedrals of France
by Anselm Kiefer
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| Fig. 49) The catalogue of the Kiefer-Rodin Exhibit at the Rodin Museum in 2017 |
It is clear that all what has been said so far in this post seems
to deny the fundamental thesis elaborated by the curators of the retrospective dedicated
to Rodin on the occasion of the centenary of death. In sum, contrary to what
has been stated in Paris this year, he was not the first of the moderns, but
(to say it with his words) the last of the Gothic sculptors.
How to explain, in particular, that the
parallel exhibition of Rodin and Anselm Kiefer (1945-) has been dedicated to
the text of the Cathedrals of France?
In particular why did Anselm Kiefer produce new works dedicated to the book for
the occasion? Obviously, Kiefer has been able to find suggestions applying also
to today’s world also in a writing so much focused on the conservation of the past.
 |
| Fig. 50) Anselm Kiefer, The Cathedrals of France, 2017 |
Kiefer identified, both in Rodin's erotic
watercolors and in several passages of Cathedrals
of France, his love passion for cathedrals. The modern artist reacted by
creating, among other things, a series of 'marble –looking books' (livres aux effets marbrés), in which he represented
visually the correspondence between architecture and woman's body. But he went
further. Here is what the German painter declared to the German radio
Westdeutsche Rundfunk: "At first I
found the book [note of the editor: Cathedrals
of France] a bit stupid. It is
written in a chauvinistic tone similar to what we would call "Blut und
Boden" [note of the editor: Blood and soil - one of the Nazi slogans].
For example, Rodin argues: in our
province, girls are still pure and clean and everything is wonderful and so on.
But if we omit these time-specific aspects, it is really interesting how he
looks at the cathedrals. He does not look at them statically, but he considers
how they change. Like Monet during the day and even over the centuries. And
then he is completely contrary to any restoration. He considers it a crime. If something
breaks down, if something crumbles, then it's okay that it does” [62]. And it is this very modern concept of precarious and ephemeral art that
conquered Kiefer; thus, he made large canvases on rotting cathedrals.
 |
| Fig. 51) Anselm Kiefer, The Cathedrals of France, 2017 |
 |
| Fig. 52) Anselm Kiefer, The Cathedrals of France, 2017 |
NOTES
[30] For an English translation of Ernst Renan’s Prayer on the Acropolis, see:
[31] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France. Country Life, Translation by Elisabeth Chase Geissbuhler, Preface by Herbert Read, Beacon Press, Boston, USA, 1965, 278 pagine. Citazione a pagina 16.
[32] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 224.
[33] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 43.
[34] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 267.
[35] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 3.
[36] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 3-4.
[37] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 6.
[38] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 6.
[39] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 6.
[40] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 4-5.
[41] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 6.
[42] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 7.
[43] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 14.
[44] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 14-15
[45] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 62.
[46] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 173-174.
[47] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 12.
[48] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 60-61.
[49] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 96.
[50] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 149.
[51] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 18.
[52] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 14.
[53] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 21.
[54] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 19.
[55] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 21.
[56] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 22.
[57] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 51-53.
[58] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, p. 65.
[59] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 50-51.
[60] Rodin, Auguste - Les cathédrales de France. Introduction by Dominique Dupuis-Labbé, Bartillat, Parigi, 2012, 249 paged. Quotation at pages 19-20.
[61] Rodin, Auguste – Cathedrals of France, quoted, pp. 174-183.
[62] Rodin und Kiefer im Musée Rodin in Paris. Künstlerische Wahlverwandtschaft?
Kulturthema am 14.3.2017 von Kathrin Hondl. See:
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