Rodin: A Magnificent Obsession

Published

Celebrating the 2003 Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial and Louisiana’s French Heritage, the University Art Museum of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the Lafayette Natural History Museum & Planetarium are proud to announce the exhibition, RODIN: A MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION, Sculpture from the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation. The dates of the exhibition are Sept. 21, 2003, through Jan. 4, 2004.

The Lafayette Natural History Museum and Planetarium, 433 Jefferson Street, will celebrate the opening with a reception and private preview at their Annual Fall Gala on Saturday Sept. 20, from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Tickets for the event are $50 per person.

This exhibition represents the full range of Rodin’s life work and includes works from The Gates of Hell (about 1900), The Kiss (1881-82), The Burghers of Calais (1884-88) and The Monument to Balzac (l897). The show features 72 pieces including more experimental works from the turn-of-the-century.

At the height of his career, Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), was regarded as the greatest sculptor since Michelangelo. Rodin left behind nineteenth-century traditions, created his own form of artistic expression, and focused on the vitality of the human spirit by using a vigorous modeling technique that emphasized his personal response to the tale being told. His pioneering work represents a critical link between traditional and modern figurative sculpture.

Iris and B. Gerald Cantor collected what is considered to be the world’s most comprehensive private collection of works by Auguste Rodin. The Cantor Foundation was created in 1978 to recognize excellence in the arts and to enhance cultural life internationally through exhibitions, scholarships, and the endowment of galleries and sculpture gardens.

The Cantors heightened the public’s awareness of Rodin’s work also by commissioning a cast of his monumental sculpture, The Gates of Hell. Accompanying the exhibit will be the award-winning documentary film, Rodin: The Gates of Hell, which was produced by Iris Cantor, and chronicles the painstaking four-year, lost-wax casting process of The Gates.

The exhibit will be on view at the Lafayette Natural History Museum and Planetarium. Museum hours are Tuesday: 9 a. m. - 9:30 p.m.;Wednesday, Thursday, Friday: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.; Saturday: 10 a.m. - 6 p.m.; and Sunday: 1 p.m. - 6 p.m.

For information on the exhibition contact: The University Art Museum at (337) 482-5326 or visit www.louisiana.edu/uam.

For group tours contact Kelly Strenge at the Louisiana Convention and Visitors Center at (337) 232-3737 or e-mail: kstrenge@lafayettetravel.com