THE OMAHA SUNDAY I IKE: S KIT EM NET? 26. IfrW.
RODIN TALKS OF HIS WORK
A Visit to the Scuptor in Hit Studio
in Paris.
IMPRESSIONS OF MAN HIMSELF
HI l.aat Id I Prod art rasile of
Tun Honda and a crll ll D l
rir Ilia Thort Ilia
Stadlo at Mendon.
PARIS. Pept. IK. -The many statues In
the hall of sculpture of th Musea du
Luxembourg are separated here and there
at almost regular Intervals by the group
and single pieces of Augusts Rodin. They
ir seen and admired In a pilgTlmage which
begin there and ends at the clergy house
of the Church of the Sacra Coeur. rue dp
Varennes, which In now on of the many
studios of M. Ilodln. and It In here that
he accords an Interview.
It la at the gateway of the spacious court,
between the paving stones of which thou
sand of grsss blade ore springing, and
In the cornera of which great mssses of
luscious foliage make one, forget the heat
of the Auruat afternoon, that Rodin I
first een. Hla arrival, he explain punctil
iously, haa been delayed by unforeseen
events. It ha In truth been heralded by
the unloading of a portrait bust which la
brought by a quartet of workmen. In the
Inevitable blue blouses, In a heavy cart
where It haa repoed on a wooden struc
ture, something like a gun carriage, with
out covering or protection of any kind. Tou
question whether an American sculptor
would dare entrust his precious cargo to
the chances of such a Journey. It has
come from a distance, from Meudon, In
fact.
Among; the Marbles.
This portrait bust, the p4ece of work on
which he la at present engaged, has been
placed on Its pedestal when the party
enters the studio, but Rodin passes It as
If Its safety were not a matter of great
Importance, and as If he cared more to
see. that other pieces, completed or In a
state of transition, should receive his wel
coming and hla guests' Introductory glance.
Truth to tell, you do not wonder that he
should forget, or at least temporarily
ignore It, for the work, In contrast with
the pieces about It, has more or less of
the commercial aspect. It Is In fact the
fulfillment of an order from a prominent
politlclal and personal friend of the sculp
tor. Ona of the contrasting marbles Is the last
ideal product of the restless brains and
hands. It shows the graceful body of a
youag girl, who seems to be breaking out
of the marble block as a bird breaks out
of the shell. It looks as If were you to
touch the neck or shoulder the marble
would retain the pressure of the finger.
The girl Is crouching on her knees and is
supported, too, by her flattened palms.
The saucy head is tilted, the nose is
retrousse and the mouth haa a crooked
smile like Sentimental Tommy's friend,
Grlsel. The hair Is tossed carelessly over
the small' ear of the right aide, and you
have the Impression that young and imma
ture as she Is, If, like Galatea, she were
suddenly endowed with speech she might
tell a risque Jest of the boulevards or at
least be frankly Impertinent.
Not Easily Named.
You ask by what name It will later on
be known to the maker of catalogues, and
Rod In shakes his head and waves a vague,
hand.
"I never know what I will call any
thing," he says finally. "I Invariably
change my titles as I go on with the work
sometimes half a dozen times. I have
thought of calling this 'Caprice,' 'A
Thought,' 'The Flower." Neither one really
expresses the statue, as you see. Words
are so insufficient, but why do they really
matter? It would be Just as well to give
It a number or a letter If that were possi
ble, for everyone who sees a work of art
reads It according to the vocabulary that
experience has afforded him."
The sculptor then leads the way to an
other pedestal placed In the middle of u
great bay window which looks out on the
facade of the church and a tangle of vege
tation growing in the Intervening gulden.
The pedestal holds two hands rising from
supple wrists. Between them is a scroll.
It Is easy to read the Intention of the ar
tist that they are not merely protective,
but secretive as well.
Ills Series of Hands.
"This Is the third of the series of hands."
explains Mr. Kodln. "The first was 'The
J land of God.' which you may renumber
In the Luxembourg. The title of that was
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JCJS i1.H f , :(A
KJ S 1 M ft, I-
obvious, one could not hare cslled It any
thing else. For the title of the second
of the series, I asked casual visitors to the
studio, who saw It In process of com
pletion, and to each It suggested a dif
ferent meaning. Some thought the man's
and woman's hands together must mean
love, others saw In the Juxtaposition, the
lde of protection, friendship, nature, life
and for this final one several titles have
been offered. So far I call It The Secret.'
but I shall change It before t am finished.
'I have always had an Intense passion
fo- the expression of tha human hands.
They have their moments. There are times
when they succumb to destiny. There are
times when they seise the void, and mould
ing It as a snowball is moulded, hurl It
In the face of fate."
Kodln moves softly from one pedestal
to another, unwrapping some of the
marbles from their swaddling clothes, call
ing attention to a vein In one which he
says is the chance tha sculptor takes, for
the marble retains Its secret until the
chisel forces the disclosure. He, la called
away for a moment to look at some archi
tectural designs intended for improvements
to his studio In the suburbs, and you have
then your first opportunity to take a
clear, face to face view of your host.
Rodln'a Appearance.
Vou remember that Jules Cheret called
him In a moment of special fervor "Rem
brandt, the sculptor." If he had substi
tuted the nam of Michael Angelo for that
of the Dutch painter you would be mora
Inclined to cast your suffrage unprotestlng.
for thera Is something about Rodin that
brings the Italian to mind. Rodin was
bom In 1SU0 and looks his age-nearly. Ha
Is short and muscular. Ills hair Is white
and he wears a long, straggling beard. His
eyes are deep set, searching.
He wears soma workaday clothes of dark
blue with a fair amount of wrinkles, as if
he had little thought for sartorial triviali
ties. He Is, It would seem, no dandy.
Neither Is he a gourmand. Through the
open door of the sails a manger you get
an uninterrupted view of the simple table
laid for the frugal evening meal. There
was a vase with a few flowers and some
fruit and brown bread; that Is all.
Simplicity Is the keynote of the salon
studio, which still retains a certain con
ventual and austere air. The walls of the
apartment are panelled, and the Immacu
late purity of the scene is enhanced by
the shining marbles. There are no books.
no flowers, no ornaments. The branches
of the trees tapping the long windows make
occasional feathery backgrounds for the
statuary, and here and there a few
sketches are pinned carelessly. There Is no
equipment of plaster, sculptor' tools,
aprons or casts to which one Is accustomed
to In like places. The only furnishings are
the pedestals and a stool.
How He Works.
Having completed your survey you stand
waiting and at the same time noting
Rodin's voice. It Is low toned, but de
cisive, and there Is never a moment's
hesitation In his directions, even though
the architect his apparently come with
arguments to refute and convince. He
dismisses the architect, and returning- to
the visitors asks if he may be permitted
to work while he talks. You assure him
that you feel It a compliment If he will do
so. and with a comprehensive nod of the
patriarchal board he puts the stool In front
of the portrait bust already referred to
snd taking up a chisel begins to hack and
hew the clay. He works with marvelous
swiftness, changing an outline there,
deepening, filling up, remodeling entire.
Once he closes his strong fingers about
the neck and pushes the head back until
the face at a new angle glvea an impres
sion of vitality It lacked before.
"I have to complete a piece of work like
this," he explains, "while the memory of
the model is fresh In my mind. The orig
inal has been sitting to me today at
Meudon. and finding it easier to complete
It In this studio I had It brought In, but
I must not leave It; If I do something will
disappear a pose, an expression that is
now absolutely fixed.
"I work as a general thing directly In
the marble as they did In the early days
of sculpture. Tou get rid In that way of all
this modern process of pointing up, which
makes the work more or less mechanical.
When I make the clay model first and
then put it Into the marble I always have
the model present as well as the com
pleted cast. You get the vital element then
which you cannot get from any amount of
dead material."
Sentiment and Geometry.
He takes a careful scrutiny of the head
again, stopping in the midst of a half fin
ished sentence. He as'aln charges its pose
with a swift movement, trenchant and
cruel, as If he were an executioner using
a knife of the guillotine to repair an anat
omical error. He notes the look of sur
prise In the faces of the group about him
and says quickly:
"Sentiment, you know, must sometimes
be the slave to geometry."
Stopping a moment while his eyes rest
on a sculptured pair which to those trained
tu believe that beauty and decoration are
synonymous might seem unnecessally
crude, he explains:
"There Is nothing more beautiful than
people as they are. The human being; as
Clod made him Is never ugly. You see a
face, a single feature even, and you re
mark on Its hldeouHtiess. This is only be
cause you have not seen the figure in I
It entirety. That disclosed you realize 1
Hint It Is not hideous, but It is really
beautiful, for harmony Is never ugly;'
It cannot be. for harmony Is the balo '
law of nature. The wonderful balance '
thut exists everywhere in the woi 1 1 must j
exist In the work of art a well, els It :
cannot be beautiful, and he who considers I
It so Is looking with the prejudiced ye of j
tradition rather than with the clear vision j
of truth.' I
Ever the Snme I.afv.
"This law of harmony once found Is
like the rock In the weary land. It hail
Infinite variety and yet it id ever the same.
Sometimes when I have been modelling
a group or a figure my work has to be!
completed with a different person posing j
from the one I commenced with. owmt,- to I
various causes and Invariably I have!
found that the introduction of that new j
figure no matter how carefully selected,
with what adherence to salient matters of
form and sixe, means the Introduction of a
new harmony, a quite different balancing
and the group Is In consequence never
what I planned In the bisinnlng, for thut
subtle force has teen loo much for the
preconceived Idea v. hich had to obey to
be subsc rvt.mt.
"Only the Supteme Being can create
The best that the artist can do Is to ex
press what he sees. Originality is a close
scrutiny of nature and o It is raiely
found, for that means hard work and
continual training. Heauty Is but another
name for life, and art does not mean
Imitation, but interpretation. One may ad
vance far enough to understand and ap
preciate the subtleties of the seasons'
passing, but it takes more than that to
appreciate the complexities of the unlverae
and that is nccei-sary unless one is con
tent with' mediocrity.
"People see what they accustom them
selves to see. The Chinese does not look
on life as the Frenchman nor as the Jap
anese. The kecret of l:fe Is utility and
so It Is of beauty. Tou must seek that
life first; seek It everywhere about you
in the natural world and when -you have
found It you ran look for axpresslon
afterward, find out to harmony of your
subjects and you will be amased at the
new paths suddenly opened to your view.
Emntlons and Beauty.
"Tere Is a historic story of a womnn
who was transformed In a moment by
the power of a sublime feeling from a
commonplace person, one even ugly pet
haps as the word Is used. Into a wonder
ful being. Her rhlld was torn from her
and thrown to the lions and she went
unhesitatingly Into the wild bessts' den
to rescue It. She had been a coward be
fore, but she was a heroine then, and yet
she was the same woman, splendid, brave,
dominated by a noble sentiment. She
was the same woman and yet not the
same, for her moment, her great mo
ment, had transformed her.
"You will learn that the body Is the
theater of emotions, where the hand, the
foot, the face, the body have parts of
equal Importance to play. No one can
be Ignored: no one can be said to be
greater than the other. You have no
horror of love, of hate, of revenge ex
pressed by the face; why should you have
when the body expresses It as well?
"The Supreme Being Is the only one
who can create,, and He Is the only one
who can finish. The end of a work of
art la the relation merely that exists In
the artist's mind between his Idea and
his work. You can finish some woik. it
Is true, the commercial work whose value
Is expressed by a ten franc jilece, a twenty
frano piece or a sou, but you must not
expect to see the work of an artist fin
ished, for he never finishes It himself.
The old Greek statues, which have come to
us In a broken, unfinished state, are they
not tha ones that have exercised the great
est Influence on our art and our life?
What of the Victory of Samothrace, the
Venus de Mllo?
Morality a False Relation.
"And there should be no argument in
regard to morality In art? There la no
morality in nattire. Morality Is a false
relation established by man. Frequently
to express some tremendous moment of
action you will find it necessary to exag
gerate the muscles of a certain part in
order clearly to define that Intensity for
which you strive that wonderful move
ment, greater than the plastic In art.
That exaggeration Is natural, for It Is
the exaggeration of nature. So It may be
that In the symbolism of Impalpable sen
timents you may seem to have exaggerated
the connection of ideas, and there will
be the outcry against an Immoral art. In
truth you have followed nature."
Rodin refers Indirectly to the criticism
which met the work of his earlier manner
by saying: "Every one who advances or
sees to a great distance will have the honor
or humiliation, as you deem It, of being
misunderstood the broken bits of plaster
thrown, the groups of statuary defaced
with Ink; they are good signs, as pain is
of the healing."
You are thinking of "Ie Pensour" as he
speaks and you mention It. M. Rodin
smiles as he wipes a bit of clay from the
chisel.
About the "Thinker."
"There are many even now who are
astonished at Its athletic appearance," he
says. "I still receive letters on the sub
ject. Thought is strong as well as serene.
One of iny literary friends expressed It
long ago better than I can by saying that
'the Ideal thinker Is neither a mystic nor
of the nervous, over refined type. He Is
a being of static force and of calm power,
In whose clear brain Is reflected the
dream of the world as a great tree Is re
flected in the tranquil waters.' The
'Thinker,' as every work of art should, is
an expression of equilibrium."
A question in regard to the value of
schooling causes M. Rodin to refer to his
early training.
"The first of my works to be publicly
exhibited, first refused by the Salon, was
'The Man with the Broken Nose, (L homme
au nes casse), which according to the old
custom had the announcement that I was
a pupil of Barye. It was exhibited at the
time when impressionism had shaken the
schools with the tremor of an earthquake,
and It aroused a still greater revolt.
"Barye believed that his pupils should
work without too many questions or sug
gestions. My schooling with him was fol
lowed by a sort of apprenticeship with
Carrler-Belleuse, whose method of teach
ing was much the same. It Is, Incidentally,
that of all great Instructors, to urge the
pupil to follow his own Inclinations and
always to study nature, to discover and
transcribe life."
Hla Earlier Works.
There were wiany years when Rodin
worked at one thing after another; for the
decorations of public buildings, notably" the
Bourse In Brussels, at the Sevres manu
factory, acquiring mobility of expression,
facility of touch and a universality of
subject, so that he could execute, the
sketches of a frleie of Oriental dancing
girls or conceive a Balxac. He speaks of
these years with a laconic word. "It Is
necessary to earn one's bread and to wait.
The moment will come If there Is besides
the need of food the eternal urge of pas
sion." He refers again to one of his early works,
"Jean-Baptlste." concerning which his
rivals alleged that he had modelled It over
a veritable human body. He asks If any
one cooiil ask for a preater compliment.
"I Insisted then that an examination j
should be made of the hundreds ofj
sketches I had drawn as preliminary," he
says. "They were astonished at the.
Illimitable labor and patience. See" he
shows thioush the opened door thousands
of faint outlines on the wall beyond;
heads, torsos
linet. and
the patience, the trial and the trial again
"The John was not according to the
formula of the Institute. He was not the
haptUer nor the preacher. He was walk
ing freely and frankly with a simple ges
ture tn announce the good tidings. He
had the va-et-vlent that the schools theni
abhorred. They do not now. I
"I have studied the antiques always, hut
I have also studied the work of the middle'
ages. I essayed all. Nothing came to me
bits of the body, profiles , j
curves "all that Is necessary;
at once. The longer I work the more I j
comprehend and the more I see to change
and improve. The earlier manner of youth1
changes to that of maturity. Imperceptibly.'
You renounce and you gain, and so you 1
approach the ultimate meaning. You make'
the detail or you ignore Jt. but you keepl
to the essential, and that is rhythm, bal-;
ance, harmony.
In the Ho-" la Pavilion.
In 100 by the sic of the exposition :
grounds there was erected a special pa-1
villon which was devoted to the principal
works of Rodin. All Paris goes today to I
Meudon, to which rlsce the pavilion, by
special grant of the state has been re
moved. The house of Rodin and the pa
vilion are tn a neck of the Seine by the
little hHls of Meudon and Issy. In the
latter place the practicing aviators dally
sweep and swing.
The guide explains to he visitor thitt
when Rodin first came to live there was
only the viaduct, the heavy trees, a view j
of the railroad lead. ng from the waste
places and the chalkv environ" to the heart
of Paris. It was a desert, as M e Parisians
understood the word desert. Rodin has
brought life Into the solitudes. Ask any-
body at the Utile wine shops, the tohaccor
Ists; the post card booths, where his house
is situated, and the Interrogation made to
one will be answered by a doi.-n. All these
places owe their existence to the Interest
he haa excited, and the onners are seem
ingly grateful.
In the pavilion the works of Rodin are
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S ime one bas said that this I desires of early years have been gratified.
"I go away from It less and Its." h
confesses, "and all the work that I can I
do there, for It pleasea me iii.ue than my
other studios for some reason, perhaps"
lie leaves the sentence unfinished.
antiquity.
(1 ows a lark of modepty on his purt and
some one else has remarked the' he. Is a
man who bas fought and stru-nled loo
much to have retained a modest outlook
or to need one.
Outside It are bits of water fur the softly
moving swans; there arc beautiful uroailrs
of trees whose branches interlace, there I
are dusky solitudes where the dreams come
and the splash of fountains in nimble
bat Ins. Rodin in the urban studio Kn.-aku
of this place with enthusiasm and satis
faction. It la the tone ot I he man whose
Monkey ua n Hla Mirk.
Maggie, an untamed monkey exhibited
Fourteenth street mid Fourth avenue,
watching her climb up and down the forty-five-foot
flHgittutf on the roof nl the Herman-American
Hank building.
M.iggle was finally rescued by Kteeple
J.h k Walter Weaver of f'amden. N. J.
Weaver haw the monkey on her perch and
offered to bring her down fur $5. Me
climbed up. and, after a short tuswl, caught
the ape aad climbed down with her The
monkey rexIMed capture by scratching and
! biting at her captor.
climbed over the picket fence that sepa
t"! bl,lldlrKS to tha roof of tha
bank, from there it was ona Jump to the
pole-New York American.
Ilalile Harbor.
Hattle Harbor did not take Its nam -rrom
oinmodore I'eary. It was en thu
map before wireless telegraphy was known,
liattle Harbor is a buhy fishing station
The water there is very deep, and It I
i In a muteum on Fourteenth street, broke; f . ,u'"u' . "'."."? for wonderful ground swell.
away from her trainer Don Clovaml ' V " ye V"U,1Y "' . ai tunes rolls In without wind from
aa noin ncr trainer, Hon (lovai.nl. , MKlu ,.,.,. ,n,iuK,,i m bv Maggie. Hh tha eastward Into Kt l.ouls sound 'burst
recently and started out to emulate th-, Li ..k.. uay ..ne night from the platform Ing." as Admiral Ha field has dencr.b.d It.
feats or took and Fcarv bv dixiovei iiik I where xhc bad been performing nod hid "with fury over Inlets thirty feet high
the jc.le. Her discovery was attended i In the attic of the building. About noon 1 or sending sheets of foam and spray spark
witli epeclacular fatuies. ami fur ! ,he g..t ut on the r.f of the museum; ling In the xunbkama fifty feat us tha sldas
haui a she entertained a crowd that blocked j building, which adjoins the bank, and j of oieclpkea."
i
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