Just back from the Art Institute, where I saw a Camille Claudel exhibit. It’s amazing. I am shocked, sad, and ashamed of how little I knew about her! Like “everybody else,” I knew her name, but the only reason I knew it was in connection with August Rodin – like “everybody else.” She is always mentioned as his apprentice and his muse, and Rodin’s bust, created by Claudel, is his most known representation.
That’s who she was in my mind. Not trying to compare myself with geniuses, I still felt like I could relate to a female character developing professionally in the shadow of a more famous male figure, inevitably treated as “a secondary” both by others and herself.
In reality, however, Camille faces way more obstacles, starting from not being allowed to work with nude models as most females, followed by constant comparing her with Rodin to the point of her works being attributed to him.
She left Rodin’s workshop to be her own person and explore the subjects she wanted to explore, only to receive more criticism for nudity in her sculptures and not receive grants for any of her works to become a full-size artwork. Then, exhibiting the signs of a mental illness, destroying most of her works and spending thirty years in the psychiatric hospital. Her family insisted on her being institutionalized despite the doctor’s suggestions to take her home and reintegrate into the family.
She died in the hospital in 1943 when France was occupied, and she was reburied in a common grave, so there is no even a place to mark. Her works were almost forgotten, and her personal exhibits happened years after she passed away.
Her art is amazing and so distinct from Rodin’s works – now I know!
Pictures from the museum website:
Hettie's Reflections 