AHW: Camille Claudel

The Kiss, Auguste Rodin

I have long been interested in the sculptress and graphic artiste, Camille Claudel. She's one of the few women of her time period who was acknowledged for her creative work. She fought to be taught at Le Salon in Paris and was admitted even though she wasn't a man. She came from a family who didn't understand her creative drive but supported her--up to a point. Rodin became her teacher, mentor, and later, lover. Their styles were so close that to this day art historians have a hard time discerning what works were hers and what were his. When they separated her style became more distinctive and uniquely her.

"Vertumnus and Pomona," Camille Claudel

"The Waltz," Camille Claudel

She had the audacity to establish her own studio and give artistic space to other women. She fought to be herself in a society where women were fighting for the rights to own property, receive an education, and vote. She spent the last years of her life in an insane asylum, involuntarily committed by her family.


Frank Wildhorn and Nan Knighton wrote a musical based on her life and I've had a few of her songs running through my head this week.

"Maybe I'm glad that I don't fit in. Life's very short and I can't see a reason for hiding. …What's wrong with wanting what's never been done before?

"I swear I'll rip through the walls if I have to or bloody my fists on the door. Yes, I'm afraid but so what? Nothing's impossible. Bring me a mountain--I have nothing to lose!--I'll strip it down to the core! If I fall that's what I choose. Tell me what's wrong with me wanting more? What's wrong with wanting what's never been done before?"

"Did I fight hard enough? Or when the battles grew too rough, should I have given in? But, here I stand and swear to you, I did the best that I could do. … 

My heart's been driven be extremes: blind with dreams, tight with fear. But still God knows that I was here and I was so alive. … 

You have to live the life you're given and never close your eyes. You hold on and stare into the skies and burn against the cold. For any moment, you might find the gold! And there was joy through it all and I am standing tall!"

And then I'm reminded of the exhibition performance by Gordeeva and Grinkov inspired by Rodin's The Kiss. It's amazing to me how a woman who died in an insane asylum, alone, was the inspiration for so much beauty.

I'm outlining my thesis and reorganizing my notes. I've let the things that bring me joy in life slip away and forgotten my research and art projects in my desperation to keep a roof over my head. Letting them sit on the shelf is one of the main reasons I've lost my balance recently. Sitting down with a sketchpad, some oil pastels, or at the sewing machine and ignoring the clock may do wonders for my battered soul.

I need to find that fire that wanted to know things and share them with anyone who would want to know. I need to remember the passion I had when I knew that "I'm glad that I'm different" and that "Life's very short and I can't see a reason for hiding."