Reflections from the Rodin Museum

Countless times I have walked by the Rodin Museum, stopping to admire the renowned “Thinker” sculpture that sits outside its gates. I've peered through the gates into the garden, wondering what might be within. For many years, I resolved to come back during visiting hours, but it was only recently that I took the time to discover the magnitude of Rodin’s influence on art.

Now, the Rodin Museum can be a bit tricky to find. It's administered by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, but it occupies its own space on Benjamin Franklin Parkway at 22nd St, near the Free Library of Philadelphia.

Upon entering the main gates (shown above left), I found a small courtyard. Immediately, I was able to block out the sounds from the bustling city and let the tranquility of my surroundings come over me. My eyes fixed on a reflecting pool made for just that, and absorbed the rich, green foliage that framed the pool, conjuring up childhood fairy tales of enchanted gardens.

Walking past the pool, I realized that in order to enter the museum, I must pass through one of Rodin's most famous works, “The Gates of Hell.” And yet, the experience of walking through the The Gates of Hell was quite the contrary to its name. My head remained clear and my mind at ease as I examined Rodin's unfinished masterpiece that is said to be a summation of his life works. Inspired by Dante’s Divine Comedy, Rodin sculpted characters that would later become works of their own, such as “The Thinker,” "Paolo and Francesca," "Ugolino," and others.

I entered the museum and was asked to give only a donation ($3 is recommended). In return, I was given insight into the life of a gifted sculptor whose forte was revealing the emotion, the personality, and the character beneath the surface of his subjects. The first sculpture I saw was massive. Scaled to be just larger than life, “The Burghers of Calais,” features not just one man, but six Calais leaders as they made their slow, but decided walk toward death. In a famous tale, these men sacrificed themselves to save their city and Rodin captured with frightening detail their agony, nobility, and fearlessness.

Beyond the burghers, I admired variations of other telling sculptures in which Rodin experimented with emotions, such as The Clenched Hand , Youth Triumphant, and Crying Woman. Rodin clearly understood that one's emotions can be interpreted not only with a face, but with a flexed fist or slumped shoulders, using almost every muscle in the human body.

I was also surprised to learn that Rodin had been commissioned to sculpt a number of well-known literary figures, including George Bernard Shaw, Victor Hugo, and Honore de Balzac. In fact, there is a whole room dedicated to various sculptures of Honore de Balzac, which made me realize that more often than not, Rodin practiced with multiple sculptures before perfecting the final piece.

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