Works

Iucundi Acti Labores

Iucundi Acti Labores 37

The work of Iris Le Rütte is determined by sculpture, drawing and poetry. Literature, and especially verse, is an important source of inspiration for the sculptural oeuvre of the Dutch artist, who is a pupil of Auke de Vries. At “Blickachsen 10” Le Rütte is showing three bronzes in the Niederhöchstadt Sculpture Park. In “Daphne in de wind” and “Daphne, vergeten herinnering” (Daphne, forgotten memory) she takes up a myth familiar from Ovid’s “Metamorphoses”: the beautiful nymph Daphne, fleeing from Apollo, prays desperately for a means of escape and instantly transforms into a laurel tree. In her interpretation of the motif, however, Le Rütte follows neither Ovid’s story nor conventional representations of the myth in art history. Instead, she underlines the sensual physicality of her Daphne figures, who stand on tip-toe as if dancing and seem to become one with nature with their arms spreading freely. The work “Iucundi acti labores” (Work that is all done is delightful) takes its title from a Cicero quote that corresponds to the Dutch proverb “na gedane arbeid is hed goed rusten” (It’s good to rest when the job is done). Le Rütte’s allegorical composition shows a cloth held up by two golden hands and draped into the shape of a bench, and it trusts to the serene power of the poetic image.

Year2003
Typecast bronze
Dimensions175 x 310 x 160 cm
Shown atBlickachsen 10, Eschborn
Eschborn