Who modeled for Auguste Rodin’s 1877 sculpture The Age of Bronze?

Auguste Neyt modeled for Auguste Rodin’s 1877 sculpture The Age of Bronze.

Neyt was a young Belgian soldier who posed for Rodin in Brussels. Rodin used the model’s standing figure to create a highly naturalistic nude, originally titled The Vanquished. The work attracted controversy because critics alleged that Rodin had cast it directly from a living body rather than sculpting it by hand.

Rodin successfully defended his method, and photographs and testimony helped establish that the sculpture was enlarged from a modeled figure. The controversy ultimately brought wider attention to the artist.

The Age of Bronze became an important early success in Rodin’s career. Its title changed as the work circulated, so it is sometimes confused with Rodin’s later sculpture The Vanquished, although that name was an earlier title for the same work.