NEWS
Exposition | Michel-Ange Rodin Corps vivants | Musée du Louvre
The Musée du Louvre is hosting its exhibition “Michelangelo and Rodin: Living Bodies” through July 20th, 2026, dedicated to the great masters of sculpture. This exhibition is the result of an exceptional partnership between the Louvre and the Rodin Museum in Paris.
We must therefore recognize the two museums for collectively bringing together some one hundred diverse works for this exhibition. Its title seeks to connect these works with reflections around the masters’ depictions of the human figure, although architecture is also evoked throughout the visit in relation to The Gates of Hell and The Last Judgement. This exhibition is, in a sense, a continuation of the exhibition “Body and Soul: Italian Renaissance Sculpture from Donatello to Michelangelo,” held in the Louvre in 2020-2021 and which already featured Michelangelo’s recently restored Slaves.
One first observation concerns the body of work of the Tuscan master. Few of Michelangelo’s works are permitted to leave Italy, a limitation that is partly offset by a wealth of drawings spanning his entire career, including sheets from the collections of the Louvre as well as the Berlin Drawing Collection. The exhibition’s selection also includes works by other artists presented for comparison, notably Michelangelo’s contemporaries. These supplementary works also shed remarkable light on the delicate history of attribution, such is the case with a group of terracotta sculptures by Gregor van der Schardt that were long attributed to Michelangelo (Florence, Casa Buonarroti).
The exhibition also offers the chance to rediscover certain works usually hidden from the public: such is the case, for example, of two terracotta figures by Rodin representing Greek Sculpture and Renaissance Sculpture (Paris, Musée Rodin) ; the evident contrapposto of the former, and the serpentine line of the latter, recall the overall gestural quality of Adam.
This exhibition, both monographic and comparative, invites visitors to explore the two artists through the themes they chose to depict, their techniques, the context of their creation, their choices of format, their relationships to their contemporaries, and finally, through the question of the myth and genius of the sculptor: How does one become a legend during one’s lifetime or after death? What are the contributing factors?
It is clear, from the very first rooms, that the curators sought to make this collection accessible to as wide an audience as possible: those with little knowledge of these sculptors’ careers will find their way around, as will amateur-connoisseurs. Specialists will turn to the catalog to fuel their own reflections on the connections drawn. Visitors, beginners or seasoned, will be captivated from the moment they enter by this forest of figures with powerful and expressive lines, as well as by certain parallels, such as the one drawn between the Crouching Adolescent attributed to the Florentine circle (London, V&A Museum) and Rodin’s Crouching Woman (Paris, Musée Rodin).
This grand program explores numerous avenues (legitimate ones, but perhaps too many?) ranging from the iconographic detail of the helmet to the theme of the artist’s hand. A more emphatic highlighting of major—and deliberate—aesthetic and technical differences could also have further enriched the discussion (regarding the “non finito,” with numerous remarks by Ophélie Ferlier-Bouat; and the limits between modeller and carver).
The first section of the exhibition features a high concentration of works, the observation of which is made difficult by the layout. Of course, the exhibition cannot be exhaustive given the limited space and time available in this setting, but while Michelangelo’s artistic circle is introduced to us, Rodin’s figure appears here less firmly situated among his peers: similarly, the mention of the Carpeaux “link ” could also have been more fully integrated into this exhibition, given the significance of the corpus of drawings he left behind focusing on the Renaissance masters, as well as the importance of his Ugolin—influenced by Roman art—essential to understanding the conception of Rodin’s Thinker.
While a visit of the exhibition leaves one somewhat uncertain about the central theme of creation, construction, and interpretation of the sculptor’s myth among these two giants as revealed through their works, consulting the catalog provides a valuable complement, as it offers an additional perspective: their bibliographic and historiographic legacy—an aspect perhaps less emphasized in the exhibition itself in order to cater to a broader audience. This catalog should also be viewed in conjunction with the brilliant introductory work on the subject, Rodin vu d’Italie 1880–1930 by Barbara Musetti (Paris, Mare & Martin, 2017).
ARIOT Chloé, BORMAND Marc (dir), "Michel-Ange Rodin Corps Vivants", catalogue de l'exposition (Paris, musée du Louvre, 15 avril - 20 juillet 2026), Paris, Musée du Louvre | Gallimard, 2026.
We must therefore recognize the two museums for collectively bringing together some one hundred diverse works for this exhibition. Its title seeks to connect these works with reflections around the masters’ depictions of the human figure, although architecture is also evoked throughout the visit in relation to The Gates of Hell and The Last Judgement. This exhibition is, in a sense, a continuation of the exhibition “Body and Soul: Italian Renaissance Sculpture from Donatello to Michelangelo,” held in the Louvre in 2020-2021 and which already featured Michelangelo’s recently restored Slaves.
One first observation concerns the body of work of the Tuscan master. Few of Michelangelo’s works are permitted to leave Italy, a limitation that is partly offset by a wealth of drawings spanning his entire career, including sheets from the collections of the Louvre as well as the Berlin Drawing Collection. The exhibition’s selection also includes works by other artists presented for comparison, notably Michelangelo’s contemporaries. These supplementary works also shed remarkable light on the delicate history of attribution, such is the case with a group of terracotta sculptures by Gregor van der Schardt that were long attributed to Michelangelo (Florence, Casa Buonarroti).
The exhibition also offers the chance to rediscover certain works usually hidden from the public: such is the case, for example, of two terracotta figures by Rodin representing Greek Sculpture and Renaissance Sculpture (Paris, Musée Rodin) ; the evident contrapposto of the former, and the serpentine line of the latter, recall the overall gestural quality of Adam.
This exhibition, both monographic and comparative, invites visitors to explore the two artists through the themes they chose to depict, their techniques, the context of their creation, their choices of format, their relationships to their contemporaries, and finally, through the question of the myth and genius of the sculptor: How does one become a legend during one’s lifetime or after death? What are the contributing factors?
It is clear, from the very first rooms, that the curators sought to make this collection accessible to as wide an audience as possible: those with little knowledge of these sculptors’ careers will find their way around, as will amateur-connoisseurs. Specialists will turn to the catalog to fuel their own reflections on the connections drawn. Visitors, beginners or seasoned, will be captivated from the moment they enter by this forest of figures with powerful and expressive lines, as well as by certain parallels, such as the one drawn between the Crouching Adolescent attributed to the Florentine circle (London, V&A Museum) and Rodin’s Crouching Woman (Paris, Musée Rodin).
This grand program explores numerous avenues (legitimate ones, but perhaps too many?) ranging from the iconographic detail of the helmet to the theme of the artist’s hand. A more emphatic highlighting of major—and deliberate—aesthetic and technical differences could also have further enriched the discussion (regarding the “non finito,” with numerous remarks by Ophélie Ferlier-Bouat; and the limits between modeller and carver).
The first section of the exhibition features a high concentration of works, the observation of which is made difficult by the layout. Of course, the exhibition cannot be exhaustive given the limited space and time available in this setting, but while Michelangelo’s artistic circle is introduced to us, Rodin’s figure appears here less firmly situated among his peers: similarly, the mention of the Carpeaux “link ” could also have been more fully integrated into this exhibition, given the significance of the corpus of drawings he left behind focusing on the Renaissance masters, as well as the importance of his Ugolin—influenced by Roman art—essential to understanding the conception of Rodin’s Thinker.
While a visit of the exhibition leaves one somewhat uncertain about the central theme of creation, construction, and interpretation of the sculptor’s myth among these two giants as revealed through their works, consulting the catalog provides a valuable complement, as it offers an additional perspective: their bibliographic and historiographic legacy—an aspect perhaps less emphasized in the exhibition itself in order to cater to a broader audience. This catalog should also be viewed in conjunction with the brilliant introductory work on the subject, Rodin vu d’Italie 1880–1930 by Barbara Musetti (Paris, Mare & Martin, 2017).
ARIOT Chloé, BORMAND Marc (dir), "Michel-Ange Rodin Corps Vivants", catalogue de l'exposition (Paris, musée du Louvre, 15 avril - 20 juillet 2026), Paris, Musée du Louvre | Gallimard, 2026.