Museum's Rodin Statue Goes Missing

A Rodin sculpture has somehow vanished in Scotland, according to the Glasgow Museums. Officials at the city's museums say a statue by Auguste Rodin, part of the French sculptor's Les Bourgeois de Calais group, was last exhibited in 1949. In the intervening three-quarters of a century, it has somehow apparently been misplaced, the Guardian reports. The exact word officials used for the sculpture is "unlocated." The plaster sculpture, which is about 6.5 feet tall and represents Jean d'Aire, one of the figures in the Calais group, was purchased by the museums in 1901. It is among 1,750 items listed as missing or stolen, the BBC reports.

The director of the Comité Rodin, an organization that keeps a catalog of Rodin works around the globe, explains that the loss of the sculpture, which today would be valued at more than $3.6 million, is "regrettable, but must be put into the context of the times"—specifically, that in the 1940s, plaster works weren't of much interest. The statue was known to have been damaged when it was last on display, and another Rodin statue exhibited at the same time was similarly broken, and its remains have been stored ever since. The Comité Rodin hopes the pieces of the Calais sculpture will ultimately be found in the archives as well. (More Auguste Rodin stories.)