Antoine Bourdelle (; 30 October 1861 – 1 October 1929), born Émile Antoine Bordelles, was a French sculptor and teacher. He was a student of Auguste Rodin, a teacher of Giacometti and Henri Matisse, and an important figure in the Art Deco movement and the transition from the Beaux-Arts style to modern sculpture.

His studio became the Musée Bourdelle, an art museum dedicated to his work, located at 18, rue Antoine Bourdelle, in the 15th arrondissement of Paris, France.

Early life and education

Émile Antoine Bourdelle was born at Montauban, Tarn-et-Garonne, in France on 30 October 1861. His father was a wood craftsman and cabinet-maker. In 1874, at the age of thirteen, he left school to work in his father's workshop, and also began carving his first sculptures of wood.

In 1876, with the assistance of writer Émile Pouvillon, he received a scholarship to attend the School of Fine Arts in Toulouse, though he remained fiercely independent and resisted the formal program. In 1884, at the age of twenty-four, he earned second place in the competition to enter the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. There he worked in the studio of Alexandre Falguière and frequented the studio of Jules Dalou, who was his neighbor.

Career

In 1885 he participated in the annual Salon of artists and won an honorable mention for his work, The First Victory of Hannibal. He rented a studio at 16 Impasse du Main, next to the painters Eugène Carrière and Jean-Paul Laurens. He worked in this studio until his death.

thumb|Leda and the Swan, Musée d'Art classique de Mougins

In 1887, he quit the studio of Falguièr, and, moved by the music of Beethoven, he made his first of what would eventually be some forty sculptures of the composer. In September 1893 Bourdelle joined the studio of Auguste Rodin. His collaboration with Rodin lasted fifteen years. In 1895, he received his first official commission, a war monument for the city of Montauban. His proposed plans, different from traditional monuments, created a scandal. Rodin intervened on his behalf, and the monument was finally erected in 1902.

In 1908, Bourdelle left the studio of Rodin and set out on his own. In 1909 he exhibited a new work, Hercules the Archer at the annual Salon of the Societé Nationale des Beaux-Arts. He began to teach at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, where his students included Giacometti, Isaac Frenkel and Adaline Kent.

In 1913 the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées was inaugurated, with decoration on the facade and the interior atrium designed by Bourdelle. This work announced the debut of the Art Deco style, and was an important step towards modernism.

Death and legacy

thumb|upright|Monument to [[Adam Mickiewicz, 1929, Jardin d'Erevan, 8th arr., Paris]]

Bourdelle, in poor health, died at Le Vésinet, near Paris, on 1 October 1929 and was interred in the Cimetière du Montparnasse, Paris, France.

Museums

Today the Musée Bourdelle in Paris sits amidst brick houses at 18 rue Antoine Bourdelle, a small street between the Gare Montparnasse and the offices of the famous French newspaper Le Monde. The museum consists of Bourdelle's house, studio, and garden where he worked from 1884 to 1929.

In the 1930s his widow opened his art studio for viewings.

A second museum, the Bourdelle Garden-Museum in Égreville, France was established by his daughter and son-in-law starting in 1969 and hosts another 56 of Bourdelle's sculptures in a garden setting.

Collections

His art work is in many public collections worldwide, including Musée d'Orsay (Paris), the National Museum of Western Art (Tokyo), List Visual Arts Center at MIT (Cambridge, Massachusetts), Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, Massachusetts), Cleveland Museum of Art, National Museum of Art of Romania, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Courtauld Institute of Art (London), Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna (Rome), Hermitage Museum (Saint Petersburg, Russia), Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (Washington D.C.), Honolulu Museum of Art, Kimbell Art Museum (Fort Worth, Texas), Kröller-Müller Museum (Otterlo, Netherlands), the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (Buenos Aires), the National Galleries of Scotland, National Gallery of Australia, Musée Ingres (Montauban), the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Middelheim Open Air Sculpture Museum (Antwerp, Belgium), and the Museum of Fine Arts (St. Petersburg, Florida), among others.

Personal life

thumb|upright|Photo (c. 1913) of Antoine Bourdelle with spouse Cléopâtre Sevastos, and daughter Rhodia Dufet Bourdelle.|alt=Photo ( c. 1913) of Antoine Bourdelle with Cléopâtre Sevastos, Rhodia Dufet Bourdelle.

In 1904, Bourdelle married artist Stephanie van Parys (also known as Vanparys, 1877–1945). His wife often served as a model for Bourdelle; by 1910 they had divorced. Together with van Parys they had a son, Pierre Bourdelle (c.1903–1966) and Pierre became an artist most active in the United States, and notable for his work at Cincinnati Union Terminal in 1933.

Bourdelle married in 1918 his former art student, Cléopâtre Sevastos (1882–1972), who also served as his model. Together with Sevastos they had a daughter, Rhodia Bourdelle (her married name was Dufet, Dufet–Bourdelle, 1911–2002) and she was an art curator.

Honors

In 1909 he was named Knight of the Legion of Honor, in 1919 Officier of the Legion of Honor, and in 1924 became a Commander of the Legion of Honor.

Sculpture

<gallery mode="packed" heights="200">

Musée Ingres-Bourdelle - La première victoire d'Hannibal, 1885 - Plâtre - Antoine Bourdelle Joconde06070001104.jpg|Hannibal's First Victory Original Plaster (1885)

The Great Warrior of Montauban - Washington, D.C..jpg|The Great Warrior of Montauban, bronze, (1898), Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C.

Le Jour et la Nuit par Antoine Bourdelle.JPG|Day and Night, marble, 1903, Musée Bourdelle, Paris

Bourdelle sculptress p1070128.jpg|The Sculptress at Work, 1906, bronze, Stanford Museum, Stanford University, California

Herakles the Archer - MET - 24.232.jpg|Hercules the Archer (1909), Metropolitan Museum of Art

Musée Ingres-Bourdelle - Buste d'Ingres 1908 - Bronze - Bourdelle - Joconde06070001137.jpg|Bust of Ingres, Musée Ingres-Bourdelle, Montauban (1908)

Antoine Bourdelle, 1910-12, Apollon et sa méditation entourée des neuf muses, bas-relief, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Paris DSC09314.jpg|Apollo with three of the nine muses, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées (1910–12)

Antoine Bourdelle - Pénélope 1912 - Montauban.jpg|La Grande Penelope, bronze, 1912, Montauban

Dallas Crow Center 15 Bourdelle Horse for Alvear monument 1.jpg|Monument to Alvear Horse, Trammell Crow Sculpture Garden, Dallas, Texas (1913–25)

Antoine Bourdelle - La mort du dernier centaure - Montauban.jpg|Dying Centaur, 1914, bronze, Musée Ingres-Bourdelle, Montauban

Bourdelle Osaka01s3200.jpg|La Liberté, Daido Life Insurance Company, Osaka, Japan

The Virgin Of Alsace by Emile-Antoine Bourdelle.jpg|The Virgin of Alsace, 1919–21, Edinburgh, Scotland

Monumento al Gral Carlos M Alvear - de Antoine Bourdelle - Buenos Aires .JPG|Monument to General Carlos M. de Alvear, Recoleta, Buenos Aires

Antoine Bourdelle, ca.1922, Monument La France, H. 9 m, bronze, Hohwiller founder, erected 18 June 1948, Palais de Tokyo, Paris.jpg|Monument titled La France) (1922), erected 18 June 1948, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Palais de Tokyo

Bust of Jean Moreas, National Garden, Athens.JPG|Bust of Jean Moreas, bronze, National Sculpture Garden, Athens, Greece

Bust of Gustave Eiffel, by sculptor Antoine Bourdelle.jpg|Bust of Gustave Eiffel at the Eiffel Tower France

Antoine Bourdelle - Sapho 1925 - Montauban.jpg|Sappho, 1925 Montauban France

</gallery>

Students

Artists who studied with Antoine Bourdelle included:

  • Athanase Apartis, Greece
  • Alfredo Bigatti, Argentina
  • Jean de Botton, France
  • Lucie Bouniol, France
  • Margaret Butler (sculptor), New Zealand
  • Samuel Cashwan, United States
  • Pablo Curatella Manes, Argentina
  • Margaret Cossaceanu, Romania
  • Céline Emilian, Romania
  • Béni Ferenczy, Hungary
  • Yitzhak Frenkel, Israel, France
  • Helen Margaret George, England
  • Alberto Giacometti, Switzerland
  • Angela Gregory, United States
  • Otto Gutfreund, Czechoslovakia
  • Minna Harkavy, United States
  • Bror Hjorth, Sweden
  • René Iché, France
  • Mladen Josić, Serbia
  • Raoul Josset, France/United States
  • David Karfunkle, Austria/United States
  • Adaline Kent, United States
  • Arnold Rönnebeck, Germany/United States
  • Ada Mae Sharpless, United States
  • Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, Portugal
  • Risto Stijović, Serbia
  • Sreten Stojanović, Serbia
  • Mihailo Tomić, Serbia
  • Josefina de Vasconcellos, England
  • Anna Marie Valentien, United States
  • Helen Wilson, United States
  • Louise Lentz Woodruff, United States
  • Ryumon Yasuda, Japan
  • Teodors Zalkalns, Latvia
  • José Luis Zorrilla de San Martín, Uruguay

For a first hand account of Bourdelle's teaching style see Arnold Ronnebeck's article from 1925, published in The Arts 8, no. 4 titled "Bourdelle Speaks to His Pupils: From a Paris Diary."

See also

  • Art Deco in Paris

Notes and citations

Bibliography

  • Colin Lemoine, Antoine Bourdelle. L'oeuvre à demeure, Paris, Paris-Musées, 2009
  • Bourdelle, Émile-Antoine, "Émile-Antoine Bourdelle, Sculptures and Drawings", Perth, Western Australian Art Gallery, 1978.
  • Jeancolas, Claude, Sculpture Française, CELIV, Paris (1992), ()
  • Ottawa.National Gallery of Canada, "Antoine Bourdelle, 1861-1929", New York, C. E. Slatkin Galleries, 1961.
  • Colin Lemoine, Antoine Bourdelle, Paris, Cercle d'art, 2004,()
  • Antoine Bourdelle, passeur de la modernité, exhibition catalogue (curators Roxana Theodorescu, Juliette Laffon and Colin Lemoine / Catalogue Colin Lemoine), Bucarest, National Museum of Art, 2006
  • Colin Lemoine, Le Fruit : une œuvre majuscule d'Antoine Bourdelle, Ligeia, January–June 2005, n°57-58-59-60, p.&nbsp;60-78
  • Colin Lemoine, "...sans ce modelé à la Rodin, à la XVIIIe siècle qui beurre le tout : Bourdelle et la question d'un primitivisme occidental", Bulletin du musée Ingres, May 2006, n° 78, p.&nbsp;49-66
  • Cléopâtre Sevastos, Ma vie avec Bourdelle, Paris-Musées-Editions des Cendres, 2005 (annoted edition by Colin Lemoine)
  • Véronique Gautherin, L'Oeil et la main (2000)
  • Antoine Bourdelle, d'un siècle l'autre. L'eurythmie de la modernité, exhibition catalogue by Colin Lemoine, Japan (Kitakyushu, Niigata, Takamatsu, Iwaki, Nagoya, Seoul), 2007–2008.
  • Musée Bourdelle (in French)
  • Portrait of Rodin from Antoine Bourdelle, on the official website of the Musée Rodin.
  • National Art Gallery and Alexander Soutzos Museum, Bourdelle Emile-Antoine, Biography (in English)