Rodin and Carrier-Belleuse French, 1840/1824-1917/1887
Signed Carrier-Belleuse, Stamped Bronze Garanti au Titre Paris and entitled Enlevement
Conceived in 1871, the bronze cast prior to 1888 when the Pinedo Foundry acquired the rights to the cast.
Bronze with dark brown patina with green and lighter brown highlights
Further images
The present work is the fruit of the compelling collaboration between the French master Auguste Rodin and Carrier-Belleuse before the start of the former artist’s independent career in the mid 1870’s.
The Abduction of Hippodamia is first documented in a 1871 catalogue for a sale in Brussels, which included a terracotta version of the model. At the time, Rodin was working for Carrier-Belleuse, who ran a large workshop to face the numerous commissions he received from all around Europe.
In recent years, the American scholar June Hargrove has highlighted that the Centaur's body, “which ripples with a bold musculature,” is characteristic of Rodin's male figures for the Vase of the Titans, which the artist sculpted around 1877 after a drawing by Carrier-Belleuse. Likewise, Hargrove points out how the screaming face of the Centaur is very similar to The Calls to Arms (1878) – Rodin’s submission for the Monument to the Defence of Paris.
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