Copied to Clipboard
Rodin Museum
The repository of the largest collection of works by Auguste Rodin outside of Paris features treasures such as The Gates of Hell and a bronze caste of The Thinker.
All told, you’ll find more than 120 of the French master’s sculptures here, as well as a fascinating collection of drawings, paintings and studies.
The variety of works on hand offers the perfect opportunity to contrast and compare the ways in which Rodin used and re-used the same stances, and even body parts, throughout his work.
The surrounding gardens are also a great place to find artistic inspiration.
The greatest hits of the famed 19th-century sculptor are all here – bronze casts of Eternal Springtime, The Gates of Hell, The Burghers of Calais, and, of course, The Thinker.
Bold, energetic and emotionally intense, these works are set in a temple-like building down the Benjamin Franklin Parkway from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which administers the collection.
Many of the sculptures are displayed outdoors in a formal garden or near the reflecting pool — offering one of Philadelphia’s most romantic settings.
The collection was brought together by Jules Mastbaum, an early film exhibitor in Philadelphia, who began assembling the works in 1913 with the idea of eventually donating them to the city.
Mastbaum hired Jacques Greber, the French landscape architect responsible for the layout of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, and his collaborator Paul Philippe Cret, to design the elegant gardens and the building in which the works are now housed. He died before the project was completed in 1929.
Limited metered parking is available on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, N. 21st Street and N. 22nd Street.
Parking is also available at the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Parking Garage, located across from the main building on Anne d’Harnoncourt Drive.
The Visit Philly Overnight Package — booked more than 190,000 times since 2001 — comes with free hotel parking (worth up to $100 in Center City Philadelphia), overnight hotel accommodations and choose-your-own-adventure perks.
One of the largest art museums in the country and a must-see attraction...