Danaïde [Danaide]

Danaide was originally conceived to be part of Rodin’s great project The Gates of Hell, inspired by Dante Alighieri’s 14th-century poem.

The subject of this sculpture is taken from a Greek myth. King Daneos had fifty daughters but no sons, his brother Aegyptos had fifty sons; in hopes of creating a stronger unified kingdom it was agreed that the daughters and sons from each should marry. Daneos, eager to win control over his brother instructed his daughters to kill their husbands on their wedding night. All except one performed the dreadful murder. As a punishment, the Danaides were damned to forever fill a broken water jar with water. Rodin depicts one of the young women crouched on the ground in despair, as the water spills from the jar.

Although unproven, the thesis by Rodin scholar Monique Laurent suggests that Camille Claudel was Rodin’s model for these sculptures. Merging fact and fiction, Bruno Nuytten’s movie Camille Claudel with Isabelle Adjani as Rodin’s counterpart shows an exhausted Camille kneeling on the floor leaning over against a piece of furniture.

Danaide was for the first time exhibited as an autonomous work in the Gallery Georges Petit in 1889 and submitted to the Salon of 1890. A marble version of the work was purchased for the Musée du Luxembourg and is now exhibited in the Musée Rodin. It was carved by Rodin’s assistant Jean Escoula.