The Cathedral (Clasping Hands)

One of Rodin’s many studies of hands, The Cathedral depicts two right hands clasped together. The sculpture was modeled in 1908 and cast in 1925. The empty space between the hands is reminiscent of that of the spaces created in Gothic architecture. Rodin published a book on Gothic cathedrals in 1914 and thus renamed this sculpture from The Ark of the Covenant.

The Detroit Institute of Arts had a Rodin exhibition in 1968, and The Thinker had been outside its Woodward Avenue Entrance since the 1920s.

The Smiths had a Rodin book. Both works were featured, and The Cathedral was in the cover.

Alva Studios, the first firm to work with museums to produce quality replicas of their works, was formed in the 1940s by Alfred Wolkenberg and Virginia Morris Pollak. Wolkenberg developed the process and Pollak performed the casting. The studio began as an educational endeavor with the goal of bringing notable art pieces into the homes of regular people. The studio grew from a four-burner gas stove to a 7,000 square foot studio employing 50 to 60 people by 1957. Their works are cast in molds and finished to resemble the material of the original. In reality, the sculptures are made of Alvastone, Wolkenberg’s own formula for a durable yet inexpensive base. The artists at Alva work to make sure that while their creations look like the originals, they are not identical, so they cannot be substituted. In 1954 they had reproduced for 22 museums and held exclusive rights to reproduce objects from the Louvre in America. Their reproductions have also been used in place of art objects on loan in museums. A museum director in Caracas once asked for a collection of pre-Columbian gold pieces, which he wanted to put in a museum because Venezuela itself did not have any of the originals. The studio continued their educational efforts by forming arrangements with public and private art schools that enabled teachers to use replications as teaching aids that students could hold and feel.

Nina Blomfield
2021-2023 Decorative Arts Trust Marie Zimmerman Collections Fellow
Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research
November 2023