Rodin_2011

19. Small Crouching Figure (Petite figure accroupie )

189 6– 99 Graphite and watercolor on wove paper mounted to original board 9 7 ⁄ 8 x 12 ¾ inches ( 25 . 0 x 32 . 5 cm)

Monogrammed in graphite at the bottom right: A. R. and signed over it: Aug. Rodin ; On the reverse of the board: A. Rodin / Drawing / Frame # 18 ; Graphite annotation, at the top left, upside down: Mirabeau and noted with graphite under the label Moirinat : Marquardt; Inscribed in pen and brown ink at the top right side: 101 Framer’s label Moirinat / Oak and tainted wood frames / Golden bronze frames / For miniatures and pictures / Chemical gold frames ; remnants of a brown label.

provenance Former Eugène Marquardt collection?

exhibition Paris, Pavillon de l’Alma, 1900, Druet number: 188 and hanging number: 101.

This drawing is exceptional for several reasons. It is one of the rare drawings still mounted to the original board, indicating that Rodin selected it for his retrospective exhibit at the Pavillon de l’Alma in Paris during the 1900 World Fair. The documentation available at the Rodin Museum Archives confirms that the drawing was shown at the level of the “ 3 rd board” of drawings. On the back, the number 101 written in ink corresponds to the number appearing in a notebook (also called “Gray notebook”) in the collection of the Rodin Museum, in which all the drawings shown in the Alma exhibit were registered. The French title Petite figure accroupie given by Rodin himself corresponds to this number. The number 188 , noted with a stencil, was mentioned by Eugéne Druet, Rodin’s personal photographer at that time, who played an important role in setting up the Alma exhibit. Furthermore, there are two more annotations in graphite on the board to which the drawing is mounted: Mirbeau indicates that the drawing was most likely one of those chosen to illustrate the second edition of The Torture Garden by Octave Mirbeau that was published in 1902 by Ambroise Vollard. The second annotation, Marquardt, refers to the Berlin editor Eugène Marquardt, although it is probably a later inscription, corresponding to a publication project. In fact, in 190 6 Marquardt planned to publish through Marcelle Adam a luxurious book presenting Rodin’s drawings. Rodin’s agenda contains two entries with the name of Marquardt in 1907 and the word drawings (November 14 and 15 ). Rodin sent a few drawings to Berlin for reproduction tests and Marquardt purchased some of them, quite possibly this one. The book itself however was never published.