DOI Heft:
Nr. 335 (April 1925)
DOI Artikel:Agard, Walter Raymond: The sculptural portrait
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19985#0026
mteRDACionAL
"adam mickiewicz" by bourdelle
the locks is thought in three dimensions which
"carry through," a device peculiar to Bourdelle
and one which produces an effect of extraordinary
vitality. The three curves of the forehead, nose
and beard are a rhythmic repetition, seen in
profde, and the face from in front presents a series
of studied planes. Not a line here is accidental,
not a mass miscalculated. The same sure under-
standing of construction distinguishes "Adam
Mickiewicz," Bourdellc's spirited representation
of the ardent Polish poet, and, with less nervous
concentration, the tawny colossal bronze head of
Heracles in the Luxembourg Museum.
Aristide Maillol has made few ventures in por-
traiture, but in what is perhaps his best, "Mon-
sieur M.," he has geometrically planned a rugged
face which has the strength and solidity of a
mountain boulder. Ivan Mestrovic's heads are
similarly designed. "That doesn't look to me like
Sir Thomas Beecham" was the comment of an
English lady as she examined the austere and
sombre bust of him by Mestrovic at Millbank.
"He might have looked like that when he was
younger," she added, in generous defense of a
sculptor who needed no apologist!
Among the younger Americans, Roy Sheldon
and Gaetano Cecere have frankly subordinated
realistic detail and character analysis to the
esthetic values implicit in portraiture. Sheldon
is a native of Missouri, who has studied under
Bourdelle, Landowski and Bouchard at Paris,
and has exhibited during the past year at the
Spring and Autumn Salons, the Anderson Gal-
leries, and various exhibitions in this country.
His heads always avoid photographic detail. Of
two imaginative portraits, his "Greek Girl" is
an attempt to realize a pagan mood, for which
there is a frank adaptation of the archaic Greek
eyes and lips and pellet hair. The "Sappho"
(exhibited at the 1923 Salon d'Automne) is a
much more personal statement. Basing the facial
background upon a discreet use of Rodin's "lump
and depression" technique, the sculptor empha-
sized the eyes and lips for his esthetic effect. The
thin, melancholy eyes, with the raised line of the
brows, and the parted, dry lips emerging from
sunken cheeks, create an impression of some
pathetic Gioconda, as mysterious as Leonardo's,
and fevered with this modern life.
In two actual portraits we see how Sheldon
has achieved more than likenesses, more than
"monsieur m." by maillol
tiventy-six
april i 92{
"adam mickiewicz" by bourdelle
the locks is thought in three dimensions which
"carry through," a device peculiar to Bourdelle
and one which produces an effect of extraordinary
vitality. The three curves of the forehead, nose
and beard are a rhythmic repetition, seen in
profde, and the face from in front presents a series
of studied planes. Not a line here is accidental,
not a mass miscalculated. The same sure under-
standing of construction distinguishes "Adam
Mickiewicz," Bourdellc's spirited representation
of the ardent Polish poet, and, with less nervous
concentration, the tawny colossal bronze head of
Heracles in the Luxembourg Museum.
Aristide Maillol has made few ventures in por-
traiture, but in what is perhaps his best, "Mon-
sieur M.," he has geometrically planned a rugged
face which has the strength and solidity of a
mountain boulder. Ivan Mestrovic's heads are
similarly designed. "That doesn't look to me like
Sir Thomas Beecham" was the comment of an
English lady as she examined the austere and
sombre bust of him by Mestrovic at Millbank.
"He might have looked like that when he was
younger," she added, in generous defense of a
sculptor who needed no apologist!
Among the younger Americans, Roy Sheldon
and Gaetano Cecere have frankly subordinated
realistic detail and character analysis to the
esthetic values implicit in portraiture. Sheldon
is a native of Missouri, who has studied under
Bourdelle, Landowski and Bouchard at Paris,
and has exhibited during the past year at the
Spring and Autumn Salons, the Anderson Gal-
leries, and various exhibitions in this country.
His heads always avoid photographic detail. Of
two imaginative portraits, his "Greek Girl" is
an attempt to realize a pagan mood, for which
there is a frank adaptation of the archaic Greek
eyes and lips and pellet hair. The "Sappho"
(exhibited at the 1923 Salon d'Automne) is a
much more personal statement. Basing the facial
background upon a discreet use of Rodin's "lump
and depression" technique, the sculptor empha-
sized the eyes and lips for his esthetic effect. The
thin, melancholy eyes, with the raised line of the
brows, and the parted, dry lips emerging from
sunken cheeks, create an impression of some
pathetic Gioconda, as mysterious as Leonardo's,
and fevered with this modern life.
In two actual portraits we see how Sheldon
has achieved more than likenesses, more than
"monsieur m." by maillol
tiventy-six
april i 92{