Original bronze casts
As the artist’s beneficiary, the Musée Rodin holds his intellectual property rights. Its mission therefore includes the enhancement and dissemination of Rodin’s work. In accordance with the artist’s wishes, the museum oversees the production of original bronze casts from the original models and molds in the artist’s bequest, and disseminates these bronzes worldwide.
The museum ensures that this activity is backed up by all the necessary scientific and ethical guarantees. Each new project for an original bronze cast entails detailed historical and archival research and must be validated by two committees comprising sculpture experts, both French and foreign.
An ethical charter ensures that precise and binding criteria are respected. The number of bronzes that may be cast from an original work is limited to twelve. Traditionally, the museum acquires one of those twelve, which then becomes part of the French national collections.
Thanks to Rodin, a unique institution was created: by allowing the museum to edit original bronzes, he endowed it with a high degree of operational and financial independence. Over the last hundred years, its bronze-casting activity has underpinned the museum’s financial equilibrium, its scientific and cultural policy, the development of its collections and the renovation of its two sites.
Contact: editionsoriginales@musee-rodin.fr
