Michael Shelden

Rich and eccentric, Edward Perry Warren was used to indulging his whims. After seeing Rodin’s The Kiss in 1900, he was determined to have a replica carved by the sculptor himself. It was to be exact in every respect except one. He asked Rodin to provide a full view of the nude man’s genitals. Four years later the piece was completed and delivered to its new owner. But Warren was disappointed. As his biographer reports, ‘the man’s genitals though visible were hardly distinct.’ The sculpture eventually went to the Tate, but not before it had spent some months gathering dust in a corner of Edward Perry Warren’s stables.