Rodin in front of "The Gates of Hell"
Gertrude Käsebier (1852 -1934)
with Left Hand resting on the Bronze Head of Baron d’Estournelles de Constant
1905
Bichromated-gelatin print
H. 33 cm ; W. 25 cm
Ph.249
At the height of his career, Rodin occasionally exchanged one of his sculptures or drawings for a photograph, as he did, in 1913, for this portrait by Gertrude Käsebier.
Close to Alfred Stieglitz and a member of the Linked Ring group, she came to Paris in 1905 to photograph Rodin. She brought her own special universe with her : her allegorical images handled subjects such as motherdaughter relationships, families and old age. While her version of the sculptor as a creative genius is thus close to the works of her fellow Pictorialists, one by no means insignificant detail makes her vision unique: she was the only woman to have ever photographed Rodin.