By Charlene Giannetti

“She was the great love of his life,” said Paula Rand Hornbostel, describing the relationship between the French sculpture Gaston Lachaise and his American wife, Isabel. “She was his muse. He loved her and put her on a pedestal.”

Lachaise did indeed place his love on a pedestal, immortalizing her form in dozens of bronze sculptures continuously displayed in museums around the world. Until recently, one of Lachaise’s Isabel-inspired sculptures, Standing Woman, was on display in the Museum of Modern Art’s courtyard. Another, Standing Woman (Elevation), 1927, modeled 1912-15 (cast1927) with Hornbostel in photo above, may be viewed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Hornbostel, Curator and Trustee for the Lachaise Foundation, is, in many ways, the keeper of this passionate flame that still seems to burn brightly seventy-four years after the sculptor’s death. Besides writing articles and helping to translate his letters, she assisted in the production of the film, Flesh in Ecstasy: Gaston Lachaise and the Woman He Loved, helped to organize an exhibit that toured Europe and the U.S. from 2003 to 2007, and recently supervised the installation of a sculpture in Paris. She has spent many days at the Modern Art Foundry in Queens where Lachaise’s sculptures are still cast.

For the exhibit’s catalogue, Hornbostel had to convince Lachaise’s family to allow publication of his photographs of Isabel, which help to inform an understanding of his sculpted nudes and “pushed the boundary of what was acceptable in the 1920s and 1930s.” Some family members felt people, after viewing the photos, would think Lachaise’s sculptures were derivative. “That’s not the case,” said Hornbostel. “He captures the soul of the sitter in his sculptures more than the photographic likeness does. The general public benefits from seeing these very artistic shots.”

The images and his many letters reflect Lachaise’s total infatuation with Isabel. “His letters are extremely passionate,” Hornbostel said. She quoted from Lachaise’s letters in her article, “Portrait of Isabel: The Photographs and Letters of Gaston Lachaise,” included in the exhibit’s catalogue. Sitting with Hornbostel, she reads one passage:

“I am thinking tonight: When you lean towards me and I adore you and it is if your brow, your thoughts, were unfolding in a marvelous, sumptuous, rich opulent bouquet, full of trembling petals, fragile and rare. A wonderful, tender gift, which my inner self embraces with radiant ecstasy.”

Truly this was a romance for the ages, a melding of the souls that helped to propel a great artist to create with the vision of his love as a constant image. “She wasn’t the ideal beauty,” Hornbostel said of Isabel. During the 1920s, when Lachaise created his sculptures, the thin flapper figure was the one celebrated in fashion. “Isabel was voluptuous, buxom.” She was also ten years his senior and married with a child. Nothing it seemed, would stand in his way to be with her, even having to relocate to the U.S. The artist moved to Boston in 1906 and in 1912 came to New York.

Hornbostel’s work with the Lachaise Foundation shows that being an art historian is anything but dull. Lachaise’s sculptures are certainly incredible works of art and can be appreciated without knowing anything about the artist. But after reading Hornbostel’s articles, detailing Lachaise’s fascination with Isabel and her influence on his work, we come away with a deeper appreciation and, it must be said, awe for their relationship. Hornbostel’s research goes beyond academics, transforming Lachaise and Isabel into flesh and blood individuals we feel we know. We can envision this love affair being made into a film, showing Lachaise and Isabel as lovers in the 1920s, and flashing forward to Hornbostel in the present time, discovering through artwork and letters this timeless romance. (Casting, anyone?)

At times, Hornbostel admits she feels like an art detective, tracking the origin or the inspiration for a work of art. After graduating from Harvard with a joint degree in French literature and art history, she worked for the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, then as a personal assistant to Fred Hughes, executor of Andy Warhol’s estate. When that assignment ended, she found she wanted to stay in Venice. “I just could not leave,” she said of her eighteen-month adventure. She worked as a teacher of business English with the Royal Cambridge School of English and at the World Monuments Fund office as assistant to the director.

Returning to the U.S., she worked parttime at WMF while earning her master’s degree in fine arts at New York University. Her work at WMF took her to the group’s Cambodia office where she learned about stone restoration at the temples of Angkor Wat. Her eleven years as an archivist and researcher at the Salander-O’Reilly Galleries introduced her to the work of Lachaise, and the wonderful family in charge of the Lachaise Foundation.

While Gaston Lachaise seems to take up a large part of her life, Hornbostel also fits in parenting, with her husband, John, their three daughters, Summer, 9, Paula Tracy, 7, and Frances, 6.  “They admire me for working, but make it hard for me to work,” said Hornbostel, with a laugh, echoing the common complaint from working mothers. She also noted that the artwork displayed in her apartment often embarrasses her children. “They ask, `Why do we have to have so much naked art up? My friends think it’s weird,’” she said.

At some time in the future, however, her daughters will also be captivated by the story of Lachaise and his enduring love for Isabel. And they will appreciate how their mother helped others learn about this love affair for the ages.

To learn more about Gaston Lachaise, go to the Lachaise Foundation website, www.lachaisefoundation.org.

Woman Around Town’s Six Questions

Favorite Place to Shop: I love J. Crew but try to save money to spend at The Corner Bookstore or L’Occitane.

Favorite Place to Eat: A tie between Sfoglia on Lexington Avenue and the Asia Society’s Garden Court Café.

Favorite New York Sight: The momentary merging of the spires of the Empire State and Chrysler buildings as you drive into Manhattan across the Queensboro Bridge.

Favorite New York Moment: The first time I met my husband at the Loyola Paddle courts on a cold November Saturday in 1996; I was wearing a long stocking hat and the lights of St. Ignatius Loyola were on, illuminating the stained glass windows above us. He walked me (and my bike) to share a beer at the Madison Pub, a New York institution that is no longer.

What You Love About New York: Summer jazz on the plaza at St Peter’s Church in midtown.

What You Hate About New York: There is always more to do than time to do it.