In the shadow of Rodin: the tragic fate of the beloved great sculptor

"I showed where to look for gold, but the gold that she found belongs only to her."

These are the words of Auguste Rodin, spoken about his most talented student Camille Claudel. When the famous French sculptor, who was already over forty, became her mentor, the girl was only 19 years old, and her extraordinary talent and unique vision were obvious.

At the age of twenty she completed her first important work - a portrait of the sixteen-year-old Paul Claudel - a clay bust depicting her beloved younger brother. Paul himself was a very bright young talent, who later found himself in poetry and drama.

Teacher and Student

Rodin had a huge creative impact on the talent and skills of Camilla as a young sculptor and provided her with support and support, but it was clear that their intricate and intimate relationship had borne fruit that had influenced the master's own work.

The relationship between Auguste Rodin and Camilla Claudel was a complex partnership that lasted almost 15 years. Eventually, Claudel began to feel the need to break free, to escape from the constant supervision of her mentor. Camille was not just a gifted pupil of Rodin, but also his faithful assistant, his muse and his lover, and often worked as a model for the works of the teacher.

The only way to develop your talent independently from Rodin and get recognition of her own work was to leave her teacher and her beloved.

Unfortunately, far from Rodin, her life was painful, and her creative career was short and unproductive.

Anniversary

This year the world celebrates the centenary of the death of Rodin and celebrates the long and widely recognized genius of the famous sculptor.

However, regarding the talent of Camilla Claudel, such a statement was practically inapplicable. Even though the growing interest in her life and creativity has been noticed since the beginning of the 80s, all films, numerous biographies and even theater productions and ballet always paid more attention to the complicated love relationships of Claudel and Rodin, paying minimal attention to the talent and creativity of the Camille.

Differences

Of all the works of Claudel today preserved less than a hundred works. Most of her sculptures were lost or destroyed by Camilla herself.

For those works that are exhibited today, it is clear that Claudel has always been interested in small intimate subjects, in contrast to the grandiose, large-scale projects of her mentor.

Most of them were cast in bronze by Eugene Blot, the Parisian agent Camille, years after they were first modeled.

Creation

In contrast to her well-known and world-recognized mentor Auguste Rodin, Claudel never worked on a paid order, although she regularly exhibited her work, received positive criticism and admiration from the public, who celebrated the outstanding artistic talent of the girl and the perfect performance that was absolutely inferior to expressiveness Creativity of Rodin.

In contrast to the works of Rodin, in the work of Camilla Claudel, however, there is virtually no explicit sexual content. Her works are filled with sensuality and quiet melancholy, which are perfectly combined with small sizes of sculptures.

Disease

Camilla decided to step out of the shadow of her teacher just to descend into the gloomy darkness of mental disorder, paranoia and psychosis. During the last thirty years of Camille's life, Claudel was isolated in a psychiatric shelter. Her mental and emotional state went into decline a few years after she broke up with Rodin.

She rarely took visitors to the shelter. Her father, who had always actively supported Camilla, died almost immediately after the girl was admitted to the hospital. Camilla learned about this only after a while. The artist's mother decided that she no longer wanted to see her daughter, and never visited her in a shelter for the mentally ill. The younger brother visited her several times and wrote to her, but he had to stay away for diplomatic trips abroad for a long time.

The most heartbreaking consequence of the mental disorder of Camilla Claudel was that she completely stopped working. For thirty years she never took clay in hands.

Auguste Rodin, despite the bitter parting, continued to support Camilla financially from a distance, creating a small fund that provides Camille even after his death.

He always wanted to have in his museum a room dedicated to Camille Claudel and her work. The Rodin Museum was opened two years after the death of the sculptor, but his desire for a room dedicated to his outstanding student was never realized.

Confession

Now, almost a century later, most of Camilla's remaining work was collected in Camilla Claudel's new house museum in the small French town of Nogent-sur-Seine, in which the girl began her career.

Many years after the unknown death of one of the most talented artists of France and the world, the name of Camilla Claudel finally received a well-deserved recognition in the form of a museum with her own name. Even after death, she managed to get out of the shadow of her mentor.