Monument aux morts

English translation

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History

From 9 July 1916, the municipal council of Montceau-les-Mines decides on the erection of a war memorial at the end of the war. On 17 November 1918, a commission is created. It appears that it was M. Peyerhimoff, Parisian administrator of the Société des Mines de Blanzy, who came into contact with Bourdelle. From 19 May 1919, he has sent to him by the head of supplies of the Société des Mines: a single-pointed pick, a double-pointed pick, a small hammer, an axe, a saw, a crowbar, a pneumatic hammer and its drill; then on 25 May: 2 miner's caps, a velvet jacket, a waistcoat, trousers, and two boiled leather hats (preserved in the reserves of the Bourdelle museum in Paris). The sculptor wished thus very early to associate the life of miners with the silhouette of the war memorial. The commission was complicated, the model being criticised locally, Bourdelle then stopped the project for nearly 5 years. The carving takes time and the monument is completed just days before the death of the sculptor on 1 October 1929. It is his widow who takes care of the delivery and the monument can be inaugurated on 12 October 1930.

Description

The miner's lamp dominates the composition. The presence of this object stems from an event that occurred during Bourdelle's visit to Montceau-les-Mines: "When he came to Montceau for the first time, Bourdelle went down into the mine. He took a deep interest in the work of the miners. At one moment, the miner's lamp that accompanied him went out. But immediately after, without the intervention of any match, it lit itself again on its own. Bourdelle was struck by this fact. He saw in this lamp, not only the protector of the work of miners, but the symbol of the dead for the fatherland, eternally reborn in our memory"1. The 4 reliefs that adorn each of the faces are inspired by the life of miners: 3 miners work in the mine; the miner's departure for the front; the work of women in the mine; soldiers in the trench. In the lower part, medallions represent mining tools. One finds in the monument of Montceau-les-Mines, the will for order and sobriety which Bourdelle had found the secret of in Greek archaic sculpture and in Romanesque art. A simplification of masses, lines and modelling, which integrates the figures into the frame for which they are intended.