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# "I am creating the image of a genius!" "Just don't forget to sign it, or everyone will think it's you"
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/ia-sozdaiu-obraz-geniia-glavnoe-ne-zabyt-ego-podpisat-a-to-vse-podumaiut-chto-eto-ty/
- Published: 2025-10-11T12:06:02.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:28:26.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Art, Paris, People

Rodin modelled his bust of Hugo without the sitter ever posing for him. For, as is well known, Hugo could not sit still even in clay, and at once turned into a symbol of France.

In 1883 Auguste Rodin received a commission for a bust of Victor Hugo, at that time still living, an eighty-three-year-old and the greatest man of letters in his country.

To achieve a mere portrait likeness, as in other sculpted portraits of Hugo, would not have been in Rodin's spirit: he wished to show not the outward appearance of the legendary author but his inner power, the storms of his thought, the mystery and unfathomability of his genius.

While working on the sculpture Rodin visited Hugo's house on the Avenue d'Eylau in Paris several times, intending to work from life, but Hugo did not want to pose and declared:

> I do not pose, I live. Observe as best you can.

And Rodin observed. He spent time with Hugo on his walks, at home, at reading and at work, at dinner and at meetings with friends. Hugo, of course, could hardly have imagined how hard it is to convey his depth. Then again, he himself could scarcely be contained in a single novel. Not seeking to create a portrait, Rodin sculpted an imprint of Hugo's spirit. Of this experience he wrote:

> In Hugo's face there is tempest, genius, a titan: not a man, but a whole epoch.

Rodin stressed that *he was trying to model the shadow cast by genius, not the flesh itself.*

In the end several busts and reliefs were produced, along with a multitude of sketches, studies, and models in clay and plaster. But, as so often with Rodin, opinion among the public was divided: some admired, others found the work coarse and raw.

Hugo himself was delighted:

> You have shown how I think. That is a rare gift.

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