Tracy’s Letters from France: Rodin Museum

How fortunate are we that Rodin gifted us with statues of his expressions of love, attachment and adoration of the human body. His singular and powerful statue The Thinker is forever pensive and complicated. His statue of The Kiss is so tender and intimate that images in flesh would be banned in Puritanical Boston. His Balzak? It’s a tour de force.

The museum’s seven-acre garden has several different areas and atmospheres. On either side of the main courtyard, a rose garden frames the Hôtel Biron (home to the permanent collections). Between Les Invalides and the Eiffel Tower, The Thinker sits atop his pillar among the box tree bushes, facing The Gates of Hell on the other side of the garden (designed in 1920 after the demolition of the outbuildings that once bordered the Hôtel Biron).

Because of the plexiglass windows, the passers-by on rue de Varenne can catch a glimpse of the Monument to the Burghers of Calais, while the sculpture of Ugolino and His Sons graces the center of the ornamental pool. Orpheus is sheltered among the trees, and the Monument to Balzac stands out against the backdrop of Les Invalides.[1]

Rodin displayed his sculptures in the garden during his lifetime, and the Musée Rodin has continued this tradition, allowing visitors to see how the sculptures interact with their natural surroundings.