Rogelio Yrurtia (December 6, 1879 – March 4, 1950) was a renowned

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sculptor of the Realist school.

Life and work

Born in

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to Basque immigrants in 1879, Rogelio Yrurtia enrolled in the local Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts in 1899. A talented student, he quickly earned a scholarship on which he traveled to

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

. There, he attended the prestigious Académie Julien, where he was apprenticed under Jules-Felix Coutan. Securing his first exhibition at the National Society of French Artists in 1903, he obtained a Grand Prize at the 1904

Louisiana Purchase Exposition The Louisiana Purchase Exposition, informally known as the St. Louis World's Fair, was an World's fair, international exposition held in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, from April 30 to December 1, 1904. Local, state, and federal funds tota ...

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. Yrurtia returned to Buenos Aires in 1905, where he presented a number of exhibitions and, in 1907, was commissioned to create a monument to 1820s-era Argentine statesman

Manuel Dorrego Manuel Dorrego (11 June 1787 – 13 December 1828) was an Argentine statesman and soldier. He was governor of Buenos Aires in 1820, and then again from 1827 to 1828. Life and politics Dorrego was born in Buenos Aires on 11 June 1787 to José An ...

. Relocating to

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, his work earned him a Grand Prize at the 1911 International Arts Exposition there. Upon his return to Buenos Aires in 1916, Yrurtia was commissioned to sculpt a likeness of

Bernardino Rivadavia Bernardino de la Trinidad González Rivadavia (May 20, 1780 – September 2, 1845) was the first President of Argentina, then called the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata, from February 8, 1826 to June 27, 1827. He was educated at th ...

, the first Constitutional

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, for a

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be consid ...

planned in his honor for

Plaza Miserere Plaza de Miserere is one of the main plazas (squares) of Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is located alongside the Once de Septiembre Station of the Ferrocarril Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (Sarmiento railroad) in the heart of the Balvanera neighborhood ...

(it's worth noting that Rivadavia, who died in exile in 1845, had requested that his remains ''not'' return to Argentina). Continuing to exhibit successfully in Argentina and abroad, the city of Buenos Aires commissioned him for the creation of a monument to grace a median plaza along Paseo Colón, a major thoroughfare south of downtown. The monument, ''Ode to Labour'', was inaugurated in 1927 and stands as Yrurtia's most ambitious work, remaining arguably his best-known. Industrialist and philanthropist Carlos Delcasse commissioned Yrurtia for his crypt in the Buenos Aires suburb of Vicente López, which the noted sculptor completed in 1936. The work's highlight, ''Justice'', was created at Delcasse's request; though not a jurist, Delcasse considered himself a "friend of the court." The sculpture was reproduced in

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids such ...

for the

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. Creating a ''

Moses Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...

'' for the 1937 grand opening of the

Juan B. Castagnino Fine Arts Museum The Juan B. Castagnino Fine Arts Museum ( es, Museo de Bellas Artes Juan B. Castagnino) is an art museum in the city of Rosario, , considered the most important of the interior of the country and the second in national terms. It is administer ...

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, Yrurtia became one of the founding members of the National Academy of Fine Arts in 1938 and he continued to exhibit periodically, working from his

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home in the Belgrano section of Buenos Aires. Yrurtia died there in 1950, bequeathing his home as a museum. ''The Boxers'', one of his last works, stands in the central courtyard. File:CantoAlTrabajo003.JPG, ''Ode to Labour'' File:Canto al trabajo (frag3)-Yrurtia.jpg, ''Ode to Labour'' – detail File:Estatua Rivadavia Plaza Miserere.JPG, Monument to Bernardino Rivadavia File:CasaDeYrurtia015.jpg, ''The Boxers'', Yrurtia Museum File:Buenos_aires_yrurtia_dorrego_7_DSC_3810.jpg, ''Alegoría de la Fatalidad'' (1926), part of Monument to Manuel Dorrego, Buenos Aires

References

ArteSur:Rogelio Yrurtia
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yrurtia, Rogelio 1879 births 1950 deaths Argentine people of Basque descent People from Buenos Aires Argentine sculptors Argentine male artists Male sculptors 20th-century sculptors