John the Baptist

Saint John the Baptist (preaching) is a bronze sculpture, by Auguste Rodin. After the controversy of his Age of Bronze, Rodin began modeling the larger than life figure in 1877. He showed a plaster model at the Salon of 1880. Rodin described to Dujardin-Beaumetz 1913 how he was inspired to create this sculpture by an Italian peasant named Pignatelli. As soon as I saw him, I was filled with admiration; this rough, hairy man expressed violence in his bearing… yet also the mystical character of his race. I immediately thought of a Saint John the Baptist, in other words, a man of nature, a visionary, a believer, a precursor who came to announce one greater than himself. The peasant undressed, planted himself firmly on his feet, head up, torso straight, at the same time putting his weight on both legs, open like a compass. The movement was so right, so straightforward and so true that I cried: ‘But it’s a man walking!’ I immediately resolved to model what I had seen.

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