The Pilgrim 1939

Marino Marini made The Pilgrim out of bronze. Bronze casting is an ancient process, going back millennia. It’s a way of making multiples, but the lost-wax method used to create a sculpture like this is still very labor intensive. Here, the rough texture of the surface shows the artist’s hand – and the hands of the many workers who would have been involved in the process. The figure of the rider seems vulnerable, and the horse is no majestic steed. The roughly worked surface emphasizes this sense of a primal encounter. You can see the artist has pushed and prodded at the clay to create a sense of depth and shadow. It's a very tactile surface. We might reflect on how this sculpture, though industrially produced, evokes something ancient, and something essentially human. To really understand it, you have to think about the material, the making, and the cultural context that shaped both.