Return from Piedigrotta 1911

Here's a reading of 'Return from Piedigrotta', made by Filippo Cifariello. I am just imagining what the artist was thinking when he made this sculpture. The slumped figure is caught in a moment of exhaustion or reflection. There's a density to the material, it's clay or bronze, but it really emphasizes the gravity of the subject, literally weighted down. The figure’s pose is so expressive, the downcast head, the way the body seems to cave in on itself. It's like Cifariello captured a moment of vulnerability or maybe even shame. The grapes could signify the morning after the night before? It makes me think about Rodin, doesn't it? That same interest in the human form to convey complex emotion, but Cifariello brings a rawness, an earthiness, to his work that’s really compelling. Sculptors are always in dialogue, pushing and pulling at what it means to represent the human condition. It is a way of understanding the world through touch and form.