Stanford in Santa Clara County, California — The American West (Pacific Coastal)

The Gates of Hell

Auguste Rodin

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

1. The Gates of Hell Marker

Inscription. I have loved these awesome doors since that winter day in 1949 when I first stood below them outside the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia and was terrified at the prospect of writing my dissertation on the Gates of Hell. In one way or another, I have lived with them for thirty-five years, and yet when it comes to lecturing or writing about this great portal there are still exhilarating things to discover, accompanied by inevitable dismay over the inadequacy of one's own language and culture to share revelations... I've seen the doors in museums and foundries, in plaster and war, in negative molds and raw bronze sections, and they never fail to surprise. Look at them in the rain or when a winter sun is low and they take on a different qualities. Light then at night form below, the way Rodin must have done in his studio a thousand times, and when you realize you don't know them as a work of art... Not other single work of sculpture know to me can so attach itself to a person for life, making constant claims on intelligence, intuition, and feeling and yet remain so fresh, changing as one changes rewarding ages and experience.

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You do not outgrow The Gates, you grow into them. --Albert E. Elsen
The Gates of Hell, 1985
Dedicated in Memory of
Albert E. Elsen, Friend and Scholar

Erected 1995 by Iris and B. Gerald Cantor.

Topics. This historical marker is listed in this topic list: Arts, Letters, Music. A significant historical year for this entry is 1949.

Location. 37° 25.95′ N, 122° 10.246′ W. Marker is in Stanford, California, in Santa Clara County. It is on 328 Lomita Drive south of Campus Drive, on the right when traveling south. This marker and statues are located on the campus of Leland Stanford, Jr. University. Touch for map. Marker is in this post office area: Stanford CA 94305, United States of America. Touch for directions.

Regionally, this marker is in California’s San Francisco Bay Area,

in Silicon Valley,

and on the Coast Ranges.

It is also on the American Pacific Coast.

Globally, it is in North America,

on the Ring of Fire,

in the Pacific Rim,

in the Western Hemisphere,

in the Western World,

and in the Anglosphere.

Historically, it finds itself in what was once New Spain

and also Mexico’s Alta California.

Other nearby markers. At

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

2. The Gates of Hell Marker

least 8 other markers are within walking distance of this marker: James Grant Fergusson (approx. 0.3 miles away); Robert Edouard Pellissier (approx. 0.3 miles away); Wallenberg Hall (approx. 0.3 miles away); The Burghers of Calais (approx. 0.3 miles away); Motion Picture Research Commemoration (approx. 0.3 miles away); Restoration of the Stanford Campus (approx. 0.3 miles away); In Pursuit of Breakthroughs (approx. 0.3 miles away); The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (approx. 0.3 miles away). Touch for a list and map of all markers in Stanford.

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

3. The Gates of Hell Marker

Leland Stanford Junior Museum image. Click for full size.

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

4. Leland Stanford Junior Museum

Welcome Cantor Art Center

Rodin Statues/Park image. Click for full size.

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

5. Rodin Statues/Park

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

6. The Shades

The Three Shades stand atop The Gates of Hell above The Thinker, gesturing downwards, heads lowered and arms extended, appearing despondent and weary. The composition consists of three casts of the same figure juxtaposed at slightly different angles. Rodin's peers believed The Three Shades signified Dante's warning, "Abandon every hope, ye who enters here," which is taken from the inscription above the Gates of Hell in Dante's Inferno.

Eve from The Gates of Hell Marker image. Click for full size.

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

7. Eve from The Gates of Hell Marker

In most Rodin catalogues, it is assumed Rodin was talking about the Abruzzezzi sisters, Adèle and Anna, Anna being the darker type referred to. By now, archive research has established that Anna impossibly could have been the pregnant model for 'Eve'; probably, Rodin - having his conversation with Dujardin-Beaumetz only twenty years after - had mixed up his recollection of the Abruzzezzi sisters with that of another Italian model, Carmen Visconti.

Adam The Gates of Hell Marker image. Click for full size.

Photographed by Sandra Hughes, January 21, 2008

8. Adam The Gates of Hell Marker

Being dissatisfied with his first outline of 'Adam', because he thought it too close to Michelangelo's style, he destroyed this first version. Rodin's second version, though, still looks like very similar to Buonarotti's 'Adam' as painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Credits. This page was last revised on June 16, 2016. It was originally submitted on October 11, 2011, by Sandra Hughes Tidwell of Killen, Alabama, USA. This page has been viewed 2,281 times since then and 70 times this year. Photos: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. submitted on October 11, 2011, by Sandra Hughes Tidwell of Killen, Alabama, USA. • Syd Whittle was the editor who published this page.