Year 1887 (1887) Medium Bronze Created 1887 | Type Sculpture Artist Auguste Rodin | |
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Location Museo Soumaya, Mexico City Similar Auguste Rodin artwork, Other artwork | ||
Pierre de Wiessant is a bronze sculpture by French artist Auguste Rodin, part of his sculptural group The Burghers of Calais. This sculpture represents one of the six burghers who, according to Jean Froissart surrendered themselves in 1347, at the beginning of the Hundred Years' War (1337 - 1453), in order to save the inhabitants of the French city of Calais from the English laying siege to the city.
Between 1884 and 1886, Rodin created nude studies of each of the burghers, then draped them in wet canvas in order to cover to better grasp how the human figures would look clothed with sackcloth, as their real-life counterparts were supposed to have worn when surrendering to Edward III of England.
Rodin made two models and one study of Pierre de Wiessant before the final sculpture. The first model shows the young man pointing to himself with the right hand, as if questioning his final destination. In the nude study he is no longer pointing to himself, but using his arm in a defensive manner. Elsen mentions that both Auguste son and actor Coquelin Cadet have been named as possible reference models.