“La jeunesse” (Youth)

Gudmar Olovson started working on the sculpture “La jeunesse” in the mid-1960s. The model was his wife Birgitta. However, as the work progressed, he realised that an addition in the form of a male model would make the sculpture complete.

In the couple’s first years in Paris they got to know another couple of the same age. The man, Jean Paris, was the grandson of Paul Claudel who was the brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. Jean Paris offered to model and the work continued. When the summer came, however, he had to return to his family home in Brangues outside Lyon and so invited Gudmar and Birgitta to accompany him. They enthusiastically accepted and took the train down to Brangues with the unfinished sculpture in their luggage. The Olovsons stayed in Brangues until the sculpture was finished and the result was a strikingly beautiful sculpture in plaster with a young Birgitta and Jean Paris representing the ideal of youth.