Call to arms

Mediums: bronze.
Location: the Rodin Museum, Philadelphia, the USA.

In 1879, Rodin applied for participation in the competition for the best monument to the soldiers who defended Paris during the Franco-Prussian war. For the competition, he created a figured composition in which a winged woman, towering above a soldier, expressively lifts her hands to the sky. Her whole appearance embodies a call to action, awakens bellicosity and faith in one’s strengths. At the same time, the refined and monumental sculpture, however, did not appeal to the jury, as happened with Rodin’s creations before. The sculpture gained worldwide fame much later when it was cast in bronze and installed in Verdun, as a symbol of the confrontation of the people of France against the German invaders.