CAMBRIDGE, MA,. The first major survey in the United States in 40 years devoted to the work of Medardo Rosso (1858-1928), one of the key figures in the birth of modern sculpture, will be presented by the Harvard University Art Museums. Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions will include 17 sculptures and offer an intimate exploration of Rosso’s working process and innovations. Premiering at Harvard’s Arthur M. Sackler Museum on view through October 26, Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions will then travel to the Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis, Missouri (November 21, 2003-February 29, 2004) and to the Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas (April 3, 2004-June 20, 2004).
Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions will focus on five sculptures spanning Rosso’s mature career. The works are Aetas aurea (The Golden Age), 1886-87; Grande rieuse (Large Laughing Woman), 1891; Bambino ebreo (Jewish Boy), c. 1892-93; Bookmaker, c. 1894; and Ecce puer (Behold the Child), 1906. Each of the works will be represented by three or four distinct castings in wax, plaster, and bronze, showcasing Rosso’s pioneering experimentation with materials and casting techniques. Rosso was intimately involved in creating the various casts of these works at a time when such work was commonly left to foundry technicians.
Rosso’s extensive exploration of techniques and materials exemplifies how art was transformed on a broad scale during the late 19th century. Rosso replaced realistic detail with vigorous, sketchy modeling, and he varied media. Rather than cast his original clay models as bronzes to be carefully finished, Rosso arrested the lost-wax method of bronze casting in midcourse, saving the wax shells as finished works. This radical innovation, which elevated wax to the status of bronze, triggered a career-long exploration of sculptural production and reproduction. Rosso wrung endless variations from his original clay models, casting and recasting them in wax, plaster (an even earlier stage in the lost-wax process), and barely finished bronze, leaving the accidents and artifacts of the casting process visible in the final products. Through his experiments, similar to those of Auguste Rodin during the same period, Rosso expanded the conceptual and expressive possibilities of sculpture and influenced the works of such sculptors as Umberto Boccioni and Constantin Brancusi.
"Medardo Rosso builds upon the Art Museums’ long-standing legacy of advancing connoisseurship," said Marjorie Cohn, acting director of the Harvard University Art Museums. "The exhibition invites students and scholars to investigate the interplay between technique and innovation. In contrasting the different casts, students and scholars will gain insight into how Rosso’s techniques helped transform the art of his time."
Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions is organized by Harry Cooper, curator of modern art for Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum, with Sharon Hecker, an independent scholar based in Milan. The exhibition underscores the Harvard University Art Museums’ dedication to researching and presenting modern art. This commitment has been demonstrated by recent exhibitions, including: Lois Orswell, David Smith, and Modern Art; Mondrian: The Transatlantic Paintings; Eat Art: Joseph Beuys, Dieter Roth, Sonja Alhäuser; Philip Guston: A New Alphabet; Landmark Pictures: Ed Ruscha/Andreas Gursky; Geometric Abstraction: Latin American Art from The Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Collection; and Windshield: Richard Neutra’s House for the John Nicholas Brown Family.
"Medardo Rosso was admired by Henry Moore, Alberto Giacometti, and David Smith, and for good reason," said Cooper. "He was a pioneer in experimenting with sculptural materials and methods, and his works, mostly figures and busts, have a resonating physical and psychological presence."
Innovative Techniques
Rosso’s oeuvre comprises fewer than 50 primary sculptures, all of which he created between 1881 and 1906. For the remaining 22 years of his career, Rosso devoted himself to recasting these primary sculptures, producing more than 400 variations in plaster, wax, and bronze. Rosso’s working process and experimentation can be studied in the variations of Bambino ebreo (Jewish Boy), c. 1892-93. Bambino ebreo served as a sort of business card for Rosso. He made many wax versions of it and gave them as gifts to patrons, critics, curators, and friends. The two wax versions in the exhibition reveal very different degrees of detail. The two bronze versions are even farther apart; one reveals Rosso’s almost painterly use of the whitish casting material, while the other is traditional in its finish and patina.
The exhibition will also include three versions of one of the largest busts Rosso ever made, Grande rieuse (Large Laughing Woman), 1891, demonstrating the variety he achieved by casting the same model in different ways. In the bronze version, Rosso took the unusual step of casting the plaster madreforma, or "mother mold," as part of the finished work. The madreforma is the utilitarian device that supports the gelatin mold during the fabrication process. The result of Rosso’s casting of the madreforma is a large background plane that echoes the silhouette of the figure, complete with imperfections left by the casting process. The finished work also features square holes, left in the cast by pins that typically would have been filled during the finishing process, and a whitish material left over from casting that normally would have been removed.
A fully illustrated catalogue developed by Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum and co-published with Yale University Press will accompany the exhibition. It includes essays by Cooper; Hecker; Henry Lie, director of the Straus Center for Conservation at Harvard; and Derek Pullen, head of sculpture conservation at the Tate in London. The book, with more than 100 color images, is the first comprehensive study of Rosso.
A series of public programs exploring Rosso’s innovations will take place at the Art Museums in conjunction with Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions. Cooper will give a gallery talk on Saturday, July 19 at 2:00 p.m. at the Arthur M. Sackler Museum. A symposium featuring scholars Alex Potts, University of Michigan; Rosalind Krauss, Columbia University; William Tucker, sculptor; Fred Licht, curator and scholar; Harry Cooper; and Sharon Hecker will be held on the evenings of October 21 and 22.
Medardo Rosso: Second Impressions has been made possible by the generous support of the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional funding has been provided by Emily Rauh Pulitzer; Dr. Sheldon G. and Irma Gilgore; the José Soriano Fund; Jessie Lie Farber in honor of James Cuno; and Sydney J. Freedberg, Jr., in honor of Professor Sydney Freedberg, Sr.
About Medardo Rosso (1858-1928)
Born in Turin in 1858, Rosso moved with his family to Milan when he was 12. After serving in the Italian military, he began studying painting and sculpture at the Brera Academy in Milan in 1882. Rosso’s artistic breakthrough came in 1883 when he made his first sculptures in wax. In 1889 he settled in Paris, where he developed a friendship with Auguste Rodin. Rosso exhibited his work widely in Europe and participated in the Exposition Universelle of 1889 in Paris. He also participated in Salons in Paris in 1904 and in London in 1906, where he completed his last sculpture, Ecce puer (Behold the Child).
