Updated 08 April 2025
On Display Permanent collection
Torso of Venus
| Date | 1925 |
|---|---|
| Materials and Techniques | bronze |
| Size（cm） | 114 x 47 x 30 |
| Inscriptions | Signed (in monogram) section of left leg: AM; Foundry mark section of left leg: Alexis. Rudier. / Fondeur. Paris.; Cast number back of right leg: 5/6 |
| Credit Line | Purchased |
| Category | Sculptures |
| Collection Number | S.1963-0003 |
This weighty, richly tactile female torso is not meant to represent a single woman's body. Maillol never tired of creating statues of the female form, and although he continued the scale and standard of a woman's flesh as motif, he never strove for a smooth skinned realism. Maillol visited Greece in 1908 where he was drawn more to the works of the archaic or strictly formalized early classical period, then to the works of the high classical period of the Parthenon. Rather than graceful forms, it is Maillol's reticently tranquil forms with their simply disciplined structures that resonate with an internal sense of a simple, powerful life force that convincingly reveal his genius. This reticence can be clearly seen in the 1910 study work for Flora. Torso of Venus was born from the full figure Venus begun in 1918 and completed in 1928. The standing figure of Venus, with the quiet positioning and movement of her right supporting leg and left resting leg combined with the slight lifting of the right hip, the soft S curve shape of the spine, the slightly pulled back left shoulder and the head turned to the left all contribute to a sense of classical contraposto. This concise torso, in its simplicity and freedom for needless coquetry, also clearly exhibits this compositional form. Here the torso is not simply a fragment of a mature woman's fleshly form, but exists rather as a mass of unique bronze that is sufficient unto itself. (Source: Masterpieces of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2009, cat. no. 145)
Provenance
Purchased by the NMWA, 1964.
Exhibition History
- 1963
- Maillol, National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2 August 1963 - 15 September 1963, cat. no. 49
- 2017
- [Traveling Exhibitions Presenting National Art Museum Collections, Fiscal 2017] Muse: Women before the Artists' Eyes: From the Collection of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, Fukushima Prefectural Museum of Art, 22 April 2017 - 2 July 2017, Akita Museum of Modern Art, 15 July-18 September, cat. no. 44
Bibliography
- 1964
- George, Waldemar. Aristide Maillol et l'âme de la sculpture. Neuchâtel, Suisse, Editions Ides et calendes, 1964, p. 190, repr.
- 1967
- Annual bulletin of the National Museum of Western Art. No. 1, 1967, Catalogue of the New Acquisitions. pp. 22-23, no. S-68. repr.
- 2006
- Masterpieces of The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art; Tokyo, The Western Art Foundation, 2006 (Japanese, preface in Japanese and English), no. 145, repr.
- 2009
- Masterpieces of The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art; Tokyo, The Western Art Foundation, 2009, no. 145, repr.
- 2017
- Muse: Women before the Artists' Eyes: from the Collection of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo: Traveling Exhibitions Presenting National Art Museum Collections, Fiscal 2017 (exh. cat.). Nakada, Asuka, ed. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2017, pp. 44, 140, cat. no. 44, col. repr.