A Rodin sculpture worth nearly $1 million was missing for 120 years: It was decorating a French family’s piano

A Rodin sculpture that dropped off the radar over a century ago has sold for nearly a million dollars after its recent rediscovery.

Sculpture fetches over €850,000

The 11-inch tall marble sculpture, entitled “Le Désespoir” (“Despair”), went for €860,000 ($996,000) at an auction in France on Sunday.

Crafted by the French sculptor Auguste Rodin, who lived from 1840 to 1917, the artwork dates back to the beginning of the 1890s.

Having been sold at a Paris auction in 1906, the sculpture’s whereabouts then became a matter of mystery for decades.

However, it reappeared when its most recent owners, who were unaware of the valuable artwork in their possession, contacted the French auctioneer Aymeric Rouillac about another matter, per AFP.

“They said ‘it’s a fake, it’s a copy’”

Speaking to CNN, Mr. Rouillac said the sculpture’s owners had written it off as a copy and had placed it on a piano, next to family photographs.

“They said ‘it’s a fake, it’s a copy,’” he recalled.

Mr. Rouillac then took the sculpture to the Comité Rodin, a group of experts on the artist. They confirmed earlier this year that the piece is genuine.

“The back, the muscles, they are perfect,” the auctioneer told CNN. “You can feel every vertebra in the spinal column.”

A “highly unusual” depiction of sorrow

A sculpture that Rodin originally created as part of a larger work known as “The Gates of Hell” during the 1880s, “Despair” is a piece that the sculptor went on to recreate several times, in a variety of materials.

The Rouillac auction house says the sculpture sold last weekend is the fifth authentic marble “Despair” so far identified by the Comité Rodin.

According to the Musée Rodin in Paris, Rodin was persuaded to sculpt multiple versions of the work by critics’ positive response to his “highly unusual” portrayal of despair.

“Although most depictions of sorrow featured a figure hiding its face in its hands or lying prostrate,” the museum says, “Rodin’s sculpture represents a woman seated on a rock with one knee bent as she strains to stretch the other leg, her hands clasped around her foot.”

Who bought the Rodin sculpture?

In a statement on Sunday, Rouillac said the newly rediscovered Rodin marble was bought by a “young banker from the west coast of the United States”.

The individual acquired the work after prevailing in a “fierce and exciting bidding war that lasted over 20 minutes”, the auctioneers added.

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