Torso of a Walking Man, 1879

Auguste Rodin (1840-1917)

Bronze

City of Beverly Hills with a donation by the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation

The "father of modern sculpture" combined the principles of Greco-Roman statuary with the blurred edges of impressionism and naturalism, achieving a conception of the human body that projects bulk, dynamism, and grace all at once. Their seeming rawness only enhances their monumentality, allowing them to not only occupy space but also to fill it. This torso study is especially disconcerting as it is more or less exactly life-size - and stands about as high as a real (albeit short) man would be.