CHARLESTON, SC.- "Rodin is one of the biggest names in the history of art, and the Gibbes Museum of Art is honored to bring fourteen of his bronzes to Charleston for the next year,” says Dr. H. Alexander Rich, the President and CEO of the Gibbes. Perhaps best known for his iconic Thinker, Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) is considered the founder of modern sculpture. At the peak of his career, he was regarded as the greatest sculptor since Michelangelo. “This exhibition and long-term loan is a coup for our city. When art lovers walk into the Gibbes they will be greeted with celebrated examples of Rodin’s work, just as they might see in New York, London, or Paris,” says Dr. Rich. The exhibition is on view through January 17, 2027.

The exhibition Rodin: All the Truth of Nature will feature fourteen of Rodin's extraordinary bronze sculptures on long-term loan to the Gibbes thanks to a partnership with the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation and the Iris Cantor Trust. From 1946 through the 1990s, the Cantors grew their collection of Rodins into the world’s largest private collection of Rodin work. Their intention was to share the collection with the wide public, and the arrival of these bronzes in Charleston keeps that mission going.


Judy Sobol, former curator of the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation, with Dr. Alex Rich of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

Rodin brought the glory of bronze figuration into the modern age, and transformed sculpture into an art that conveyed the vitality of the human spirit. He created his own immediately recognizable form of artistic expression. Rodin is considered as seminal to the creation of modern sculpture as Manet, Monet, van Gogh, and Cézanne are to the creation of modern painting. “There is nothing like experiencing a Rodin up close. This will be a rare chance for many in our community, and the many visitors to our destination, to engage intimately with Rodin’s masterful work," adds Dr. Rich.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

The undisputed star sculptor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Rodin revived for the modern world the expressive, theatrical, and supremely naturalistic styles associated with Ancient Greek bronzes of the distant past.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by Banks Creative/Erin Banks).

He did not gain his first commission until he was 40 years old in 1880, and that commission became the central focus of twenty years of his life and career. While the Gates of Hell forever remains Rodin’s unfinished masterpiece (he never saw it translated to bronze in his lifetime), this exhibition features one of the early maquettes for the Gates. In it, viewers can see the ideas and overall composition for the Gates forming, with abstract renderings of future iconic sculptures like The Thinker, The Kiss, and The Three Shades already present.


The Gibbes Museum of Art (photo by Banks Creative/Erin Banks).

Rodin’s genius lay in his ability to model sculpture that captured the moving and evolving figure, and that combined bodies in ways that expressed emotions and provoked responses. Because both during his lifetime and after his death his work could be seen all over the world, it is celebrated for its innovations, risks, and inventiveness.

Rodin continues to influence artists as an example of one who accepted being controversial if it meant being true to his own aesthetic ideals. “Rodin’s mastery is something viewers never forget after they come face to face with his ability to make bronze come to life. Rodin evoked emotions through sculpted human forms in ways that are second to none,” adds Dr. Rich.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

Rodin made his personal passions the subtexts of his artworks, with a sexual candor that today is often still astonishing. And in authorizing posthumous casts of his work, Rodin became a pioneer for other artists who made art to be fabricated by others – artists like Sol Lewitt and El Anatsui.

Another way Rodin modernized sculpture was by insisting that a part of a figure – such as a torso or a hand – could by itself convey meaning and thus be a complete work of art. He found such meaning in fragments of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture being unearthed in archaeological digs during his lifetime, the last half of the nineteenth century.

In this exhibition, intentional partial figures like Torso of the Walking Man convey his response to these unintentional fragments. And they point forward to sculptures of body parts created by artists of today.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

One more way Rodin is modern: marketing. His goal was to make significant artwork and to be famous and wealthy because of it. He used the resources available to him in the worlds of art and media to achieve his goal. He was also eager to pick up the mantle of “master sculptor” not merely in his work as an instructor of artisans but also in the eyes of the wider public; he wanted recognition like that which had been ascribed to his own precursors like Donatello, Michelangelo, and Bernini.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

“The opportunity to present Rodin’s bronze sculptures for a full year is hopefully a gift for our community and for every art lover. We want museumgoers of all ages to be able to experience the magnitude of Rodin’s artistic prowess, and for artists in our community to be inspired by his example to create wondrous art of their own,” adds Dr. Rich.


Installation photo courtesy of the Gibbes Museum (photo by MCG Photography).

About the Gibbes Museum of Art

The Gibbes Museum of Art, a beacon in the American South for arts and culture since 1858 when the Museum’s art collection was founded as the Carolina Art Association, is heralded as one of the earliest and most longstanding arts institutions in the United States. The Museum’s collection spans 350 years, and features some of the country’s most celebrated artists ‒ including contemporary, modern and historical works. With world-class rotating exhibitions and a dynamic visiting artist residency program, the Gibbes is a southern museum with a global perspective. The Museum’s mission is to enhance lives through art by engaging people of every background and experience with art and artists of enduring quality, providing opportunities to learn and discover, to enjoy and be inspired by the creative process.

The Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation

The Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation promotes and recognizes excellence in the arts and enhances cultural life internationally through its support for art exhibitions and scholarship and for the endowment of galleries and sculpture gardens at major museums. Most unusual for philanthropic foundations, the Cantor Foundation also owns a significant collection of Rodin sculpture. During the last four decades it has loaned individual works and entire exhibitions to museums in more than 160 cities in Australia, Canada, Japan, Singapore, and the United States. Nearly eleven million people have seen these shows.