Lot 195: Eugene Druet

Eugene Druet
study of sculpture by rodin, late 1890s
Silver Print, signed 'E. Druet...', inscribed 'A Rodin' and annotated 'F34' in the negative, numbered in pencil on the reverse,
396 by 298mm
Eugene Druet was an amateur photographer who owned a bar near Rodin's studio. Rodin had developed a keen interest in the expressive potential of photography and entered into a brief working relationship with Druet in the late 1890s. Their collaboration was short-lived, ending in 1903, but in this time Druet made an impressive series of studies, capturing the mood, texture and substance of the sculptor's work.
Provenance:
Sotheby's, New York, February 7th 1977, lot 113.
Literature:
For details of the Druet-Rodin collaboration see: Maria Morris Hambourg, Pierre Apraxine, Malcolm Daniel, Jeff L. Rosenheim and Virginia Heckert, The Waking Dream - Photography's First Century - Selections from the Gilman Paper Company Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1993, p. 333.