Galerie Dina Vierny, Paris
Otto Gerson, New York
James Goodman, Buffalo (acquired from the estate of the above in 1967)
Maria Luisa Blanca de Branger & Luis Henrique Nuñez, Caracas
Sale: Christie’s, New York, February 16, 1984, lot 8
Jorge Casarès, Buenos Aires
Acquired in 1995

Georges Grappe, Catalogue du Musée Rodin, Paris, 1947, illustration of the larger version pl. 37
Albert E. Elsen, Rodin, New York, 1963, illustration of the larger version pp. 26-29
Robert Descharnes & Jean-François Chabrun, Auguste Rodin, Lausanne, 1967, illustration of the larger version p. 56
Ionel Jianou & Cécile Goldscheider, Auguste Rodin, Paris, 1967, illustration of the larger version pl. 9
John L. Tancock, The Sculpture of Auguste Rodin, Philadelphia, 1976, illustrations of the larger version pp. 358-59 & 361-62
Cécile Goldscheider, Auguste Rodin, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre sculpté, vol. I, Paris, 1989, illustration of the larger version pp. 128-29
Antoinette Le Normand-Romain, The Bronzes of Rodin, Catalogue of Works in the Musée Rodin, vol. II, Paris, 2007, illustration of another cast p. 638 

Work is in very good condition. Attractive reddish brown patina. Surface is clean with a few small spots of accretion around feet. There is a casting seam on the figure's right arm which is inherent to the casting process. A few small nicks around base and one small scuff on right shoulderblade as well as minor patina rubbing on back of right calf, otherwise fine.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

The present sculpture is a fascinating example of Rodin’s study and depiction of the movement and musculature of the human figure. It has been argued that Rodin’s recent trip to Italy and his study of Renaissance and Baroque sculpture proved highly influential for the present work. Many point to Giovanni Francesco Rustici’s three figure group the Preaching of St. John the Baptist over the north door of the Baptistery in Florence as a prime source of inspiration for the present work. In Rustici’s work St John, clothed in a camel-hair shirt, gesticulates toward the sky and stands in classical Renaissance contraposto, his primary weight born by his left leg (see fig. 1). In Rodin’s sculpture we find instead a nude of the Saint—interestingly very few nude depictions of him exist, even in portraiture depicting St. John and Jesus as babies—striding forward with his right hand raised upward. In the initial sktech for this work a cross was held against the figure’s body, but Rodin soon disposed of this. The firm planting of both of the feet was a sharp departure from the classical norms of academic sculpture.

"Rodin, in his own words, imparted to St. John ‘the progressive development of movement;’ he wanted the figure to be read as if it were passing through successive stages. Allowing one’s eye to follow the sculpture beginning with the left leg, up through the torso, and then descending to the right leg, is equivalent to watching the figure shift its weight as if it were pushing off with the back leg as it begins the stride and were then comng down on the front foot. This explains why both feet are solidly on the ground… Further, Rodin knew that no cast of a stationary figure nor photograph of a moving one could give a resumé of these movements in a single pose, as he had done. His sculpture was a blow struck at the inertia of academic statuary and its frozen formulas based on earlier art. It is not the rhetoric of St. John’s features and gestures that provides the real drama, but the powerful transfer of energy enacted within the body. The expressivness of the sculpture resides in the response of the body’s surface to its physical displacement as well as to the intense spiritual effort of communication. Rodin once said, ‘I have always endeavored to express the inner feelings by the mobility of the muscles’” (Albert E. Elsen, op. cit., pp. 29-31).