Sorrow, ca. 1903 - 1904

Sorrow is a fine example of Rodin's so-called découpage technique, a technique that Rodin regularly used by isolating elements from larger sculpture groups and working them out separately. The sculptor repeated the head in the The Gates of Hell (c. 1880-1890), in Fugit Amor (c. 1885), The Prodigal Son (1905), la Centauresse (1901-1904) and also in Ugolino (between 1882 and 1906). The Musée Rodin owns a version of the representation in plaster in bronze. Besides the undeniable artistic value, Sorrow also has an important historical value. It illustrates the close bond between the sculptor and Emile Verhaeren, who received this sculpture as a gift in mid-1915 on the occasion of a reading session where Rodin had become acquainted with Verhaeren's war poems.