Portrait of Paul Verlaine by Auguste de Niederhäusern, known as Rodo, bust in black patinated plaster, signed, dated and dedicated: "Rodo, 1911, A l'ami Julot."
Auguste de Niederhäusern was born in Vevey, Switzerland, in 1863. Nicknamed Rodo from an early age, the nickname stuck with him all his life. In 1881, he enrolled at the Ecole des Arts Industriels in Geneva, where he remained until 1885, winning honors and prizes in modeling and sculpture every year. At the same time, he took courses at the Beaux-Arts de Genève, where he met Carlos Schwabe.
Armed with his Geneva diplomas, Rodo went to Paris and enrolled in Henri Chapu's studio at the Académie Jullian. He was then admitted to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1889, in Alexandre Falguière's studio, which enabled him to exhibit at the Salon and then at the Exposition Universelle, where he presented two portraits in the Swiss Pavilion.
He frequented Rodin's studio between 1892 and 1895, and his time there was of vital importance to the sculptor's aesthetic development.
As soon as he arrived in Paris, Rodo frequented Verlaine's "Wednesdays" at the Hôtel Royer-Collard. Although he did not call himself a Symbolist, Verlaine allowed himself to be carried to the head of the movement.
Rodo was the first to immortalize the poet's features, presenting a wax medallion with the poet's portrait at the Salon de la Société des Artistes Français in 1889.
In 1892, he presented a bust of Paul Verlaine at the first Salon de la Rose-Croix (p.54 of the Salon de la Rose+Croix catalog).
The work was acclaimed by critics and the Symbolist movement alike, and helped establish the artist's reputation in the capital, as well as beyond French borders, where the bust was presented at the Cercle pour l'Art in Brussels.
On the death of Paul Verlaine in 1896, Rodo approached his loved ones and proposed his bust for the erection of a monument in his honor. The Comité du Monument à Paul Verlaine, whose members included Stéphane Mallarmé and Auguste Rodin, appointed the sculptor for the monument in 1897.
The project encountered numerous difficulties, but the Monument was finally inaugurated in 1911 in the Jardin du Luxembourg.
The plaster cast we are presenting is reproduced in the book "Rodo, un sculpteur entre la Suisse et Paris, catalog raisonné", Claude Lapaire, Benteli Editions, p.289.
