Leonard Baskin
Ruth and Naomi, 1978/ cast 1985
Cast bronze
Museum Purchase
Amid the fluctuating tastes of the twentieth century, Leonard Baskin remained faithful to figurative art. He preferred to address issues of mortality and suffering, often turning to grand narratives from religious or mythological texts. However, he hoped that they would transcend their origins and express universal ideas. He once explained this in almost Biblical language himself, stating that “our human frame, our gutted mansion, our enveloping sack of beef and ash is yet a glory. Glorious in defining our universal sodality and glorious in defining our utter uniqueness. The human figure is the image of all men and of one man. It contains all and can express all.”
In Ruth and Naomi, Baskin takes a Judeo-Christian story from the Book of Ruth and uses it as a vehicle to think about grief, love, and devotion. Naomi is Ruth’s mother-in-law. Both of her sons, including Ruth’s husband, have just died, and she sends away her other daughter-in-law. However, in one of the most beautiful and moving passages of the Bible, Ruth refuses to go, saying, “Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.”