Carl Emil Milles
Ruskväder
1903
Bronze, on bronze plinth 23 x 38 x 23 cm Signed and inscribed 'C. Milles Holland' on front of plinth to left. - Exhibition and customs label under the plinth. - Dark brown, anthracite-coloured patina with partial green oxydation.
As the most celebrated Swedish sculptor of the 20th Century, Carl Milles is widely known for his large-scale public commissions and monumental fountains he designed from the 1930'in North America and Europe. The present work belongs instead to the first part of the artist's career, and specifically to the time spent in the Netherlands at the turn of the century, when he got acquainted to the hardship of life conditions for the local working communities and he was influenced by the style of A. Rodin and C. Meunier. This composition, known so far only from later replicas, is considered to be the first version of the subject and the very example exhibited at the Sweden Pavillion at the VIIth Venice Biennale in 1905.
Provenance
Italian private collection; Private collection, Emilia-Romagna
Literature
Erik Näslund, Carl Milles. En biografi, Höganäs 1991, p. 49 with ill.
Exhibitions
Venice 1905 (La Biennale di Venezia), VI. Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte della Città di Venezia, cat. no. 467 (exhibition label under plinth)