Le Grand Cheval (The Great Horse)
Artist
Raymond Duchamp-Villon
(French, 1876 - 1918)
Date1914
MediumBronze
DimensionsOverall: 39 × 23 5/8 × 41in. (99.1 × 60 × 104.1cm)
ClassificationsSCULPTURE
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Terms
Object number58.4
On View
On viewCollections
CopyrightNo known copyright restrictions.
Label TextRaymond Duchamp-Villon championed the fusion of art and modern technology. In The Horse, he molded the anatomical parts of the horse's body into a streamlined synthesis of animal and machine. Duchamp-Villon accentuated the tilt of the horse's head to balance the graceful arc of the mane against the thrusting force lines of the mechanized body. The delicate counterpoise of opposing elements endows his mechanical horse with a classic stability and a commanding, potential energy.
Duchamp-Villon intended to enlarge The Horse and have it cast in steel -- the ultimate material of the Machine Age. The outbreak of World War I prevented him from realizing those plans. After his death at the front in 1918, his family authorized posthumous, enlarged bronze editions cast from the seventeen-inch plaster left in the sculptor's studio in Puteaux, France. The Great Horse, measuring approximately one meter high, achieves the intended monumental scale the sculptor had envisioned for his masterpiece.
Judith Zilczer
2005
