The tale of the knocker
by Lucy Atkinson
What a gorgeous, different, outstanding door knocker! It was created by a French sculptor, Emile-Antoine Bourdelle early in the 1900s. Bourdelle believed that history’s best sculptures were those that were integrated with architecture – he would fit right in as a staff sculptor at Architectural Classics!
He was born in 1861, and created the Medusa head sculpture four years before his death in 1925 – when his talent had already had a lifetime to fully develop. He was known as an expressionist artist, but his not-strictly-realistic work did not come from a lack of ability in detail. Medusa, as well as his other sculptures, are created with beautiful lifelike lines, and the Medusa head-knocker has such a striking, gravity-defying appearance. Rodin, who created the sculpture The Thinker, became an admirer of Bourdelle’s, and Bourdelle became his assistant when he was young. A street is named after him in Paris, and he was interred at Paris’s famous Montparnasse cemetery.
It is actually meant to be Perseus’s hand from which Medusa’s severed head hangs. The Greek myth is quite heart-wrenching, for an imaginary story! Medusa was once a beautiful nymph, but was raped by Poseidon in Athena’s temple … the goddess turned her hair into snakes, and made her face so frightening to behold that the mere sight of it would turn men to stone. Medusa was pregnant with Poseidon’s child when the King of Seriphus, Polydectes, sent Perseus to behead her in her sleep. He needs several magical, rare items to complete his task, and his genius is in looking at her in a mirror to complete the task rather than directly – so he is not turned to stone. Pegasus, the winged horse, and another mythological creature, Chrysaor, sprung forth from her neck when her head was removed.
Such a sad story, but such a beautiful door knocker…
Photo credits: World Myths and Legends in Art
May 21st, 2007 at 20:52
Hey, what are you on about?!!! :)
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:40
Rightyo … hey I was wondering, if lion’s head knockers represent strength and the Anna Livia knockers are like the lifeblood of Dublin and stuff, what the flip does a knocker of a murdered, magically mutilated, outcast raped and feared woman represent?
Only artists know
June 2nd, 2007 at 22:19
Too right!
June 18th, 2007 at 10:43
[...] Bourdelle created the beautiful Medusa head knocker from the May 18 blog post, and we found a promising quote from him in there, that he believed that [...]