How is character and identity displayed in two pieces of public art?
John Clinch Auguste Rodin (1840 – 1917)
Diana Dors 1991 Bronze Height: 172 cm
Monument to Balzac 1896 Bronze Height: 270 cm
By Tinashe Chikerema
• Aims of the Essay • A comparison of memorial sculpture of Rodin and Clinch • To focus on Clinch and Rodin and discover how the influences, techniques, inspiration and artistic development are reflected in Clinch’s Diana Dors 1991, and Rodin’s Balzac 1891. • To place sculptures by Clinch and Rodin into broad historical contexts • To analyse and compare Clinch’s sculpture with Rodin’s focusing on form, processes, materials, patrons, cost and the transition into the public domain.
In this essay I will be discussing how character and identity can be portrayed in two separate pieces of public art. I’ll be talking about John Clinch’s sculpture of Swindon’s superstar and the UK’s answer to Marilyn Monroe, Diana Dors, I will also be talking about and contrast Auguste Rodin’s figure of Balzac. I’ll be discussing how both sculptures had such a big impact and how they became iconic figures in their surrounding areas and all over the world. What is Public Art? Public art is not an art form. Its size can be huge or small. It can tower fifty feet high or call attention to the paving beneath your feet. Its shape can be abstract or realistic (or both), and it may be cast, carved, built, assembled, or painted. It can be site specific or stand in contrast to its surroundings. What distinguishes public art is the unique association of how it is made, where it is, and what it means. Public art can express community values, enhance our environment, transform a landscape, heighten our awareness, or question our assumptions. Placed in public sites, this art is there for everyone, a form of collective community expression. Public art is a reflection of how we see the world the artist’s response to our time and place combined with our own sense of who we are. Public art is a part of our public history, part of our evolving culture and our collective memory. It reflects and reveals our society and adds meaning to our cities. As artists respond to our times, they reflect their inner vision to the outside world, and they create a chronicle of our public experience. Swindon’s Policy on Public Art: Swindon Borough Council’s Public Art Policy, adopted in 1988, uses a principle called Percent for Art. The policy was adopted to knowledge the recognised of the role that artists can have in enhancing and improving the quality of the public domain. It was established to maximise opportunities to engage artists in making artworks for Swindon. The policy encourages developers to allocate a percentage (i.e 1%) of the capital costs of any new building, refurbishment and landscaping scheme towards the production of the works of public art. Percent for Art is an internationally used funding mechanism for the commissioning of public art. The Arts Council of England endorsed Percent for Art in 1988 as an important means to integrate the work of artists into the planned development of public space. Percent for Art schemes have been established in more than 200 local authorities, development corporations, and NHS Trusts, in a variety of towns and cities where normal practice is for at least 1% of the capital costs to be allocated for public art. Robert Carnwath, QC, on behalf of the Arts Council of England when advocating for Percent for Art being adopted by local authorities stated… “The contribution made by such works to the appearance of the scheme and to the amenities of the area.” Whilst there is no statutory requirement for the 1% contribution for public art, the length of time the practice has been operating and the breadth to which the contribution is sought does mean that the provision of public art has become more widespread and commonplace.
The local authorities’ role is one of encouragement in most cases, though in some circumstances, a contribution will be required under Government Circular. John Clinch Born at Folkstone, Kent, he studied fine Art at Kingston School of Art, 1951-55, and sculpture at the Royal college of Art, 1957-61. Kent, he was the son of a milliners' representative. In his early career he had trained to be an accountant in the City of London, and it was during this time that he discovered his love and talent for the arts at evening classes. In 1951 he began to learn his craft at Kingston school of art, gaining his National Diploma in 1955. From 1955 to 1957 he saw national service as a military policeman, including a stint at Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe in Paris. He then spent four years at the royal college of Art’s school of sculpture under the guardianship of John Skipping and, later, Bernard Meadows. In his guardian year he won the RCA Silver Medal and a drawing prize that gave him the opportunity to travel to Italy and France. He was later to return to Italy for a summer residency at the British school in Rome in 1989, and travelled to Valencia, Spain, with an Arts Council Travel Award in 1993.
Diana Dors The Diana Dors sculpture is a flamboyant voluptuous sculpture depicting Diana Dors a famous movie star and also a born Swindonian, she stands at the West Swindon cinema cineworld complex, a fitting resting place for the movie associated figure. Although the figure has her name on it if you research Diana herself you will see that in actual fact the sculpture resembles her very little. The over cartooned image of the figure with her crude exaggerated appearance has little in common with the real woman and has taken heavy criticism, the public although recognize the statue as being Diana aren’t very fond of it, the council wanted to take the sculpture down because it was getting worn and lost a lot of its shine, a group of Diana Dors fans saved the sculpture by investing in a small renovation themselves and it wasn’t consequently taken down. Although people disagree with what or how John Clinch has portrayed her aesthetically and at first appearance, he has depicted her personality rather than what she looked like on the outside he has shown her over indulgent movie star lifestyle, he has depicted her with other exaggerated features to emphasize the fact that she wasn't ordinary and that she was in actual fact a movie star. Clinches Voxpop gives us an incite as to the way and what influences John Clinch in when it came to creating his Diana Dors sculpture, the fact that he lives to resemble well known figures and to have them mix in with the people of the surrounding area is testament to someone like Auguste Rodin, and his Burghers of Calais, Rodin wanted them to be close to the floor to show them at the same height as the people and although Clinch created Diana Dors to be different, voluptuous and exaggerated and unlike the public, he still left her in the public domain that she would be most fitting in. in this we see how Clinch wants to have his work portrayed and how he is trying to put an identity across to the people maybe of familiarity and local celebrity so to speak.
Auguste Rodin: The son of an inspector in the Paris Prefecture de Police and a former seamstress, Auguste Rodin grew up in a working-class district of Paris known as the Mouffetard. His early instruction was provided by the "Petit Ecole" (the Ecole Imperiale Speciale de Dessin et de Mathematiques), a school for the training of decorative artists, where he acquired a thorough grounding in the traditions of French eighteenth-century art, and by informal studies of anatomical structure under the tutelage of Antoine-Louis Barye, the French Romantic sculptor, best known for his animal subjects. Refused entrance to the prestigious Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Rodin escaped the rigid neoclassical training that still dominated its curriculum in the mid-1850s, but forfeited the early success that École graduates were ordinarily assured. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past. He was schooled traditionally, took a craftsman-like approach to his work, and desired academic recognition, although he was never accepted into Paris's foremost school of art. Sculpturally, Rodin possessed a unique ability to model a complex, turbulent, deeply pocketed surface in clay. Many of his most notable sculptures were roundly criticised during his lifetime. They clashed with the predominant figure sculpture tradition, in which works were decorative, formulaic, or highly thematic. Rodin's most original work departed from traditional themes of mythology and allegory, modelled the human body with realism, and celebrated individual character and physicality. Rodin was sensitive to the controversy surrounding his work, but refused to change his style. Successive works brought increasing favour from the government and the artistic community. From the unexpected realism of his first major figure – inspired by his 1875 trip to Italy – to the unconventional memorials whose commissions he later sought, Rodin's reputation grew, such that he became the preeminent French sculptor of his time. By 1900, he was a world-renowned artist. Wealthy private clients sought Rodin's work after his World's Fair exhibit, and he kept company with a variety of high-profile intellectuals and artists. He married his lifelong companion, Rose Beuret, in the last year of both their lives. His sculptures suffered a decline in popularity after his death in 1917, but within a few decades, his legacy solidified. Rodin remains one of the few sculptors widely known outside the visual arts community. He made the plaster cast or clay model, his assistants or another studio would carve (in marble) the finished version. There were many versions in every medium of Rodin’s work, e.g. over 300 authorised bronze copies of the Kiss by 1917.Rodin’s working methods increasingly left evidence of the working process, chisel marks, imprints of cloths, fragments. Perhaps inspired by Michelangelo’s unfinished works, but unlike Rodin, Michelangelo intended to finish his work. One early piece by Rodin displays this influence clearly; The Age of Bronze’
Auguste Rodin: ‘The Age of Bronze’, 1877, bronze, life size.
The Age of Bronze was similar to the ‘Third age of Man’ when man shaped bronze tools. Innocent man, uncorrupted by civilisation awakens painfully and must learn to survive in this new society. A re-worked image originally holding a spear as a memorial to the fallen in 1871, reworked for the 1877 Salon. The closeness of the sculpture to the model, the lack of classical idealisation caused criticism: that the sculpture had been cast from life: i.e. a cheat.
Michelangelo: ‘The Dying Slave’ (Julius’ Tomb) 1513 which illustrates the influence Michelangelo’s compositions had on Rodin.
The success of these sculptures and others led Rodin to receive commissions from a number of clients, including in 1891 from a society of French literature enthusiasts. They asked Rodin to produce a sculpture of the great writer Balzac.
Monument to Balzac: The sculpture was originally commissioned by the first neoclassical artist Henri Chapu, unfortunately he died in 1891 and his work was unfinished so Emile Zola, the new president of Societe des Gens de Lettres, set all wheels in motion so that Rodin was invited as a candidate. Rodin promised to deliver a 3 meter tall bronze figure within 18 months, till January 1893, to be placed at the Palais-Royal in Paris and was accepted by the Societe. To capture the spirit of the writer who had died in 1850, Rodin followed his traces and made several trips to the Tourraine, Balzac's home region, making clay portrait sketches of men with a similar physiognomy. A number of Rodin’s preparatory studies show Balzac nude and paunchy or athletic, but later in his preferred work clothes. Although Rodin never saw him in person, he had clothes resembling those of the Balzac’s made by the writer’s former tailor, using a cloak similar to Balzac’s writing cloak for his final statue. He finally found the structure for the figure in 1895, and shifted his focus to the drapery. According to the sculptor Pompon, Rodin "soaked his dressing gown in a large basin of plaster, and dressed his statue in it". The clothing became increasingly simplified. The fabric was filled out, amplifying the form: Rodin wanted a figure whose dramatic élan would sweep upwards into the sky; he created an almost abstract symbol of the author's power. Only the head remains visible, dominating a body that arches backwards. He created movement in the hair. "In this powerful statue, its body trembling in the folds of the robe, sleeves empty, Balzac stands with his huge head thrown back, alert like a wild animal, drinking in with eyes, nostrils, lips, and scenting the swirling rumor, the fever of the human comedy." (Andre Fontainas). The sculpture is above life size with a rugged face; unruly hair and a large head. The figure is wrapped in a large robe. This disguises his body and limbs, and also gives hanging folds. Body is left generalised. The form of left hand evident under the cloak and there is an Emphasis on his leonine head. The head is thrown back with a sombre serious expression
and deep set eyes that stare in the distance. There is a twist in body and the figure leans with one foot forward. Overall it has a Monumental physical presence With Balzac striking a Theatrical pose. However importantly it is not idealised and it has no props and with the body concealed the attention is on the head as Rodin want to display the intellect of Balzac rather than the actual likeness.
When the plaster was exhibited at the 1898 Salon the critics went wild, pouring scorn on the formless block. They compared it to a toad in a sack, a statue still wrapped, a block of salt caught in a shower. Not only did the Société reject the work, but it received extraordinary controversy in the press.
Criticism centred on the fact that Rodin's treatment of a famous person did not follow the formula for aggrandizing the subject and on the lack of a finished surface, so important in academic sculptural style. They nicknamed it the menhir, the snowman. The Societe refused to accept this work that broke with all the traditional conventions for a commemorative monument, and that ignored the requirement for a realistic portrait. And so Rodin kept the statue, returned the money, and refused all offers to buy it. It was not until 1939 that a bronze cast was erected in Paris, on the boulevard Raspail. In the final section of this essay, I conclude with a similar contrast of both John Clinches’ Diana Dors, and Rodin’s monument to Balzac, from analyzing both of the artists and their
work it is seen that both of them were trying to portray more than just how they aesthetically looked, John Clinches’ Diana Dors was lavish and over exaggerated he portrayed her in a light showed her as movie star and lesser than a typical person from Swindon or even someone that is well known in Swindon but more of an iconic figure that now adorns the outside of a cinema complex for all the Swindonians to see for the foreseeable future. In a complete similarity to this Rodin created Balzac in the image of what he wanted Balzac to be seen in a more intellectual image rather than an aesthetically accurate portrayal and personality to the artists.