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A Very Long Engagement

Nineteenth-Century Sculpture and Its Afterlives

July 29, 2017 Through May 27, 2018

In the Front Gallery

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Sir Albert Gilbert (British, 1854-1934), Offering to Hymen (detail), 1884-86
Photo Credit: 

Laura Shea

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Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton of Stretton (British, 1830-1896), The Sluggard (detail), 1882 modeled; 1890 cast
Photo Credit: 

Laura Shea

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Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917), Tête de Balzac [Head of Balzac], 1897 original composition; 1962 cast
Photo Credit: 

Laura Shea

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Offering to Hymen (detail), 1884-86

Sir Albert Gilbert (British, 1854-1934)
Bronze
1985.24

Sir Albert Gilbert (British, 1854-1934), Offering to Hymen (detail), 1884-86

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The Sluggard (detail), 1882 modeled; 1890 cast

Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton of Stretton (British, 1830-1896)
Bronze
1985.4

Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton of Stretton (British, 1830-1896), The Sluggard (detail), 1882 modeled; 1890 cast

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Tête de Balzac [Head of Balzac], 1897 original composition; 1962 cast

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917)
Bronze
2001.6.3

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917), Tête de Balzac [Head of Balzac], 1897 original composition; 1962 cast

Presenting more than a dozen statuettes from the Museum’s collection, this exhibition invites viewers to experience a century of European and American sculpture, dating from 1890 to 1990. The works have been selected and researched by Dr. Gülru Çakmak and her students in the seminar “Modernizing Sculpture from Canova to Duchamp,” offered at UMass Amherst in fall 2016. Through a semester-long study of these small-scale and tabletop sculptures, students made fascinating discoveries worth sharing beyond the classroom. You can find their final essays at the course website: scalar.usc.edu/works/modernizing-sculpture.

The works on view in the exhibition are not merely representational, but interactive. As one moves around Pierre Auguste Renoir’s bronze relief Danseuse au Tambourin, the figure appears to dance. Some works, such as Alfred Gilbert’s tiny, dazzling Offering to Hymen, prompt us to telescope our attention from the larger form to minute and semi-abstract details. Visitors to the exhibition will be rewarded by an intimate and prolonged engagement with the works on view. Slow down and look closely: these sculptures subtly perform their magic.

Curated by Gülru Çakmak, Assistant Professor of Nineteenth-Century European Art, University of Massachusetts Amherst

This exhibition is made possible by the Joyce Marcus Art Exhibition Fund.