At the height of his career, Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) was regarded as the greatest sculptor since Michelangelo. Straying from nineteenth-century academic conventions, Rodin created his own sense of personal artistic expressions that focused on the vitality of the human spirit. His modeling techniques captured the movement and depth of emotion of his subjects by altering traditional poses and gestures. His pioneering work has been a critical link between traditional and modern figurative sculpture.