Auguste RODIN (1840-1917)

Le frère et la Sœur
Bronze with dark patina
Signed on the base: A. Rodin
Inscribed on the back of the base: A. Rudier fondeur Paris
Stamped inside: A. Rodin
Conceived circa 1890 and cast before 1922

Dimensions:
Height: 38.4 cm (15 1/8 in.)

Sold in 2002

Provenance:
Musée Rodin, Paris
Alfred Heidelbach, Paris
Mrs. Alfred Heidelbach, Paris
Her sale: Paris, Hotel Drouot, 16 December 1933, lot 2
Private collection, Paris (acquired at the above sale)
Thence by descent

Exhibited (another cast):
1900, 1 July-27 November, Paris, Pavillon de l'Alma: Exposition Rodin, no. 29.
1904, 1 May-23 October, Düsseldorf, Städtische Kunstpalast: Internationale Kunstausstellung, no. 1726.
1924, 24 May-22 June, Anvers, Salon des Fêtes: L'art contemporain, no. 65.
1935, 28 April-21 May, Bruxelles, Palais des Beaux-Arts, L'art contemporain, no. 558.
1948, 10 April-4 July, Bâle, Kunsthalle: Auguste Rodin, no. 42.
1996, 21 May-26 August, Vienne, Palais Harrah: Auguste Rodin, Eros und Leidenshaft, no. 5.
2001, 12 March-15 July, Musée du Luxembourg: Rodin en 1900, L'Exposition de l'Alma, no. 19, illustrated in the catalogue.

Literature (another cast):
Léon Maillard: Etudes sur quelques artistes originaux. Auguste Rodin statuaire, Paris, H. Floury éditeur, 1899.
Octave Mirbeau: Auguste Rodin et son œuvre, Paris, 1900, p. 23 (ill. of the marble).
Gustave Geffroy: Rodin, Art et Décoration, no. 10, October 1900, pp. 97-110.
Rainer Maria Rilke: Auguste Rodin, Leipzig, 1922, no. 35 (ill. of the stone).
Georges Grappe: Catalogue du Musée Rodin, 1944 (5th edition).
Edouard Herriot: Rodin, Paris, 1949, no. 36.
Marcel Aubert: Rodin Sculptures, Paris, 1952, p. 49.
Rodin, Phaidon Press, London, 1956, no. 60, illustrated.
B. Champigneul: Rodin, London, 1967, p. 203, no. 107.
Ionel Jianou & Cécile Goldsheider: Rodin, Paris, 1967, p. 104.
C. Goldsheider: Rodin, London, 1970, p. 122, no. 60.
J. L. Tancock: The sculpture of Auguste Rodin: Philadelphia, 1976, p. 122, no. 25-2.
Jacques de Caso & Patricia B. Sanders: Rodin's Sculpture. A Critical Study of the Spreckels Collection, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, 1977.
Alain Beaussire: Quand Rodin exposait, Paris, Muséee Rodin, 1988.
Rudenstine Pulitzer & Pulitzer: Modern Painting, Drawing & Sculpture collected by Emily & Joseph Pulitzer Jr., Cambridge, Harvard University Arts Museums, 1988.
Claudie Judrin: Rodin et la Hollande, Paris, Musée Rodin, 1996.

Return to Expertise


Le Frère et la Sœur belongs to a relatively small group of works in which Rodin explored the relationship between mother and child or, as in the present case, brother and sister.
In this work, the organisation of the group is very close to that of Shame (Absolution), (c. 1889 - 90), that was originally conceived for the Porte de l'Enfer, and, in pose, the older sister is related to one of Rodin's grandest partial figures, Etude de Jeune Femme Assise (Cybèle) for which the popular model Madame Abruzzezzi had posed. However, the youthful charm of Le Frère et la Sœur looks back to the work produced by Rodin when he was employed by Carrier-Belleuse.
'In this fine plaster cast, Rodin expands the theme of mother and child to include the love of an elder sister for her infant brother. (…) The rigid position of the girl and her self involvement create a sense of timeless tranquillity, while her active brother seeks to attract her attention . (…) This tender group conveys intimacy and charm, without the sentimentality of many contemporaneous treatments of the theme of an adult and child.' (Jacques de Caso and Patricia B. Sanders: Rodin's Sculpture, a Critical Study of the Spreckels Collection, San Francisco, 1977, p. 103)

Rodin had conceived this sculpture to be viewed from all angles and perspectives, which was a challenge to the received tradition of sculpture as something to be seen from one precise standpoint. Thus, Le Frère et la Sœur presents a decisive break and a transition in nineteenth century sculpture.

Another marble version of this group, with slight differences, was executed by Rodin in 1905 for the collector Karl von der Heidt.

This cast of Le Frère et la Sœur was originally the property of Alfred Heidelbach (1851 - 1922), an American collector who was the President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Paris before the First World War. It is probably then that he made contact with Rodin, as his visit is recorded in the archives of the museum. At his death, in 1922, his collection was inherited by his wife Julie, who in turn died in 1932. The sale of her estate, held on the premises of the Heidelbach's luxurious house at 19, avenue d'Iéna, Paris, was a great social event that raised an enormous FF 2,000,000 of the time, and at which the present piece was purchased. It is therefore more than likely that this piece was purchased directly from the artist as Alfred Heidelbach had frequented him and there is no record of such purchases being made by his widow after Heidelbach's death.