Auguste Rodin

Armand Boucher, Nantes (circa 1930) 
Sale : Millon & Associés, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 26 September, 2008, lot 72
Private Collection (acquired at the above sale)
Private Collection, USA (acquired from the above in 2010 and sold : Sotheby's, New York, 7 November 2013, lot 419)
Acquired at the above sale

Georges Grappe, Catalogue du Musée Rodin, Paris, 1926, no. 233, marble version illustrated p. 93 
Rodin Sculpture and Drawings (exhibition catalogue), Hayward Gallery, London, 1970, no. 22, another example illustrated p. 38 
Albert E. Elsen, Rodin, London, 1974, another example illustrated p. 61 
John L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, no. 20-24, another example illustrated p. 203 
Jacques de Caso & Patricia B. Sanders, Rodin's Sculpture, A Critical Study of the Spreckles Collection, San Francisco, 1977, no. 25, another example illustrated p. 164 
Albert E. Elsen, In Rodin's Studio, Paris, 1980, no. 33, plaster version illustrated n.p. 
Albert E. Elsen, ed., Rodin Rediscovered (exhibition catalogue), National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1981, no. 274, another example illustrated p. 336 
Rainer Crone & Seigfried Salzmann, ed., Rodin, Eros and Creativity, Munich, 1992, fig. 13, another example illustrated p. 199 
Rodin, The B. Gerald Cantor Collection (exhibition catalogue), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1986, no. 8, another example illustrated p. 25
Rodin Sculpture and Drawings (exhibition catalogue), Hayward Gallery, London, 1986, no. 128, another example illustrated p. 72 
Rodin en 1900, L'exposition de l'Alma (exhibition catalogue), Musée du Luxembourg, Paris, 2001, no. 71, marble version illustrated p. 197
Antoinette Le Normand-Romain, Rodin et le bronze, Catalogue des oeuvres conservées au musée Rodin, vol. I, Paris, 2007, no. S6734, another example illustrated p. 379

The bronze is sound with a nuanced reddish brown patina. Apart from some minor surface scratches, a light build-up of dust in the crevices and some wear to the patina on the most protruding areas, this work is in very good original condition.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Fugit Amor was originally sculpted for Rodin's monumental project The Gates of Hell, designed for the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris. While the Museum itself was never built, Rodin worked on this project for over twenty years, looking to Lorenzo Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise and Dante'sDivine Comedy for inspiration. The present sculpture also exemplifies themes from Baudelaire's Les Fleurs de mal, which Rodin illustrated during the same period. "Like the Divine Comedy, Les Fleurs de mal expressed a tragic view of the human condition, and Rodin responded to Baudelaire's evocation of sexual decadence and images of seduction, fatal women and rejected, remorseful men" (Joan Vita Miller & Gary Marotta, Rodin: The B. Gerald Cantor Collection, New York, 1986, pp. 11-12).

In Fugit Amor the two figures, touching but unable to embrace, exemplify Rodin's fascination with unconsummated passion. Ginger Danto has written of the current model, "Propelled by the presumably harsh winds of Hell's second circle, these two figures, however much they strain toward one another, never connect, for they are not meant to... That they are eternally arrested in this extraordinary alignment makes their struggle all the more poignant and illustrative of the banal axiom that, the more one attempts to grasp something, the more it surreptitiously slips away" (Rainer Crone & Sigfried Salzmann, ed., Rodin: Eros and Creativity, Munich, 1992, pp. 198-99).