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Auction archive: Lot number 24

Alberto Giacometti

Estimate
£550,000 - £750,000
ca. US$712,993 - US$972,264
Price realised:
£651,700
ca. US$844,833
Auction archive: Lot number 24

Alberto Giacometti

Estimate
£550,000 - £750,000
ca. US$712,993 - US$972,264
Price realised:
£651,700
ca. US$844,833
Beschreibung:

24Alberto GiacomettiFemme deboutincised with the artist's signature and numbered 'Alberto Giacometti 7/8' on the right side of the base; further incised with the foundry mark 'Susse Fondeur Paris' on the reverse of the base; further stamped with the foundry mark 'Susse Fondeur Paris Cire Perdue' on the underside of the base bronze 44.5 x 7.8 x 11.1 cm (17 1/2 x 3 1/8 x 4 3/8 in.) Conceived circa 1961 and cast in bronze in 1993 by Susse Fondeur, Paris, this work is number 7 from an edition of 8 plus one 0 cast and a further Fondation Alberto et Annette Giacometti cast. This work is recorded in the Alberto Giacometti Database under no. 1953, and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity from the Giacometti Committee. Full CataloguingEstimate £550,000 - 750,000 ‡ Place Advance BidContact Specialist Kate Bryan Specialist, Head of Evening Sale +44 20 7318 4026 kbryan@phillips.com
Overview'It isn't necessary to make things large to make them monumental; a head by Giacometti one inch high would be able to vitalize this whole space.' —Hans Hoffman A galvanising example of Alberto Giacometti’s recurring motif of the standing woman, which ran throughout the 1940s and until his death in 1966, Femme debout portrays a thin, rising silhouette whose arms have fused to her torso, to the point of morphing almost perfectly into a vertical line. Ascending just over 45cm high, the bronze sculpture is reminiscent of Giacometti’s early forays into the human form, which materialised on a small – sometimes minuscule – scale in the wake of World War II, and subsequently became increasingly tall. Conceived circa 1961, Femme debout immediately follows the culmination of Giacometti’s exploration of the female form, embodied by his monumental four Grandes femmes, 1960, which formed part of an unrealised project commissioned by Chase Manhattan Plaza in New York City. In its jewel-like dimensions, Femme debout conjures the artist’s ability to convey soul and humanity in the most minute of details, producing the woman’s long, lean body from a blocky base – Giacometti’s signature pedestal. In essence, the artist portrays the ethos of a female figure; not in a naturalistic, descriptive manner, but as a presence occupying space. Conceived circa 1961, Femme debout emerged at the dawn of a key moment of critical and commercial success for Giacometti. That year, the artist won the first prize at the Pittsburgh International Exhibition, appeared on the front cover of the French magazine L’Express, and was photographed by Henri Cartier-Bresson at the Galerie Maeght, walking along his sculptural figures for what would soon thereafter become an iconic image. A year later, in 1962, he would receive the grand prize for sculpture at the Venice Biennale, and be the subject of a major retrospective exhibition at the Kunsthaus in Zurich. Alberto Giacometti at his studio in Paris, France 1962 © The Estate of Alberto Giacometti (Fondation Giacometti, Paris and ADAGP, Paris), licensed in the UK by ACS and DACS, London 2020. Image: Wolfgang Kuhn/United Archives via Getty Images. In Femme debout, the nameless figure is sculpted as a narrow, fragmentary, yet infinitely delicate entity. Her blade-like figure seems to defy the laws of gravity, hoisting vertically despite surrounding pressure. With her glistening, mysterious edge, Femme debout is a solid yet ephemeral vision, both defining and defined by the space around her. This paradox precedes the sculpture's physical constitution, as it was equally enacted during Giacometti's process of execution. Indeed, to conceive his idiosyncratic sculptures, the artist would build up the figure, and subsequently remove more and more of the form in a blur of frenzied activity. Here, the figure of the woman appears to have been constructed from some fundamental beacon of existence, as though Giacometti managed to condense the reality surrounding him to harness the woman's true form. Forming part of a wider body of work defined by slender, emaciated forms, Femme debout conveys a vivid but fragile presence; a discreet meditation on the human condition. Indeed, the chiseled woman's resemblance to Giacometti's myriad other anthropomorphic sculptures prompts reflection on ‘that precious point at which human beings are confronted with the most irreducible fact: the loneliness of being exactly equivalent to all others’.i 'My problem is that no matter how hard I try to start with the structure, I start in my head and it’s very big. Then I enter into the eyes, and the nose and the mouth, and it becomes abstract. So for me to catch all the head at the same time, I need to make it very small so that I have control over the figure.' —Alberto Giacometti Perhaps one of the most prolific subject matters within the painterly and sculptural realms, the female muse nonetheless held particular meaning for Giacometti, whose model w

Auction archive: Lot number 24
Auction:
Datum:
20 Oct 2020
Auction house:
Phillips
null
Beschreibung:

24Alberto GiacomettiFemme deboutincised with the artist's signature and numbered 'Alberto Giacometti 7/8' on the right side of the base; further incised with the foundry mark 'Susse Fondeur Paris' on the reverse of the base; further stamped with the foundry mark 'Susse Fondeur Paris Cire Perdue' on the underside of the base bronze 44.5 x 7.8 x 11.1 cm (17 1/2 x 3 1/8 x 4 3/8 in.) Conceived circa 1961 and cast in bronze in 1993 by Susse Fondeur, Paris, this work is number 7 from an edition of 8 plus one 0 cast and a further Fondation Alberto et Annette Giacometti cast. This work is recorded in the Alberto Giacometti Database under no. 1953, and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity from the Giacometti Committee. Full CataloguingEstimate £550,000 - 750,000 ‡ Place Advance BidContact Specialist Kate Bryan Specialist, Head of Evening Sale +44 20 7318 4026 kbryan@phillips.com
Overview'It isn't necessary to make things large to make them monumental; a head by Giacometti one inch high would be able to vitalize this whole space.' —Hans Hoffman A galvanising example of Alberto Giacometti’s recurring motif of the standing woman, which ran throughout the 1940s and until his death in 1966, Femme debout portrays a thin, rising silhouette whose arms have fused to her torso, to the point of morphing almost perfectly into a vertical line. Ascending just over 45cm high, the bronze sculpture is reminiscent of Giacometti’s early forays into the human form, which materialised on a small – sometimes minuscule – scale in the wake of World War II, and subsequently became increasingly tall. Conceived circa 1961, Femme debout immediately follows the culmination of Giacometti’s exploration of the female form, embodied by his monumental four Grandes femmes, 1960, which formed part of an unrealised project commissioned by Chase Manhattan Plaza in New York City. In its jewel-like dimensions, Femme debout conjures the artist’s ability to convey soul and humanity in the most minute of details, producing the woman’s long, lean body from a blocky base – Giacometti’s signature pedestal. In essence, the artist portrays the ethos of a female figure; not in a naturalistic, descriptive manner, but as a presence occupying space. Conceived circa 1961, Femme debout emerged at the dawn of a key moment of critical and commercial success for Giacometti. That year, the artist won the first prize at the Pittsburgh International Exhibition, appeared on the front cover of the French magazine L’Express, and was photographed by Henri Cartier-Bresson at the Galerie Maeght, walking along his sculptural figures for what would soon thereafter become an iconic image. A year later, in 1962, he would receive the grand prize for sculpture at the Venice Biennale, and be the subject of a major retrospective exhibition at the Kunsthaus in Zurich. Alberto Giacometti at his studio in Paris, France 1962 © The Estate of Alberto Giacometti (Fondation Giacometti, Paris and ADAGP, Paris), licensed in the UK by ACS and DACS, London 2020. Image: Wolfgang Kuhn/United Archives via Getty Images. In Femme debout, the nameless figure is sculpted as a narrow, fragmentary, yet infinitely delicate entity. Her blade-like figure seems to defy the laws of gravity, hoisting vertically despite surrounding pressure. With her glistening, mysterious edge, Femme debout is a solid yet ephemeral vision, both defining and defined by the space around her. This paradox precedes the sculpture's physical constitution, as it was equally enacted during Giacometti's process of execution. Indeed, to conceive his idiosyncratic sculptures, the artist would build up the figure, and subsequently remove more and more of the form in a blur of frenzied activity. Here, the figure of the woman appears to have been constructed from some fundamental beacon of existence, as though Giacometti managed to condense the reality surrounding him to harness the woman's true form. Forming part of a wider body of work defined by slender, emaciated forms, Femme debout conveys a vivid but fragile presence; a discreet meditation on the human condition. Indeed, the chiseled woman's resemblance to Giacometti's myriad other anthropomorphic sculptures prompts reflection on ‘that precious point at which human beings are confronted with the most irreducible fact: the loneliness of being exactly equivalent to all others’.i 'My problem is that no matter how hard I try to start with the structure, I start in my head and it’s very big. Then I enter into the eyes, and the nose and the mouth, and it becomes abstract. So for me to catch all the head at the same time, I need to make it very small so that I have control over the figure.' —Alberto Giacometti Perhaps one of the most prolific subject matters within the painterly and sculptural realms, the female muse nonetheless held particular meaning for Giacometti, whose model w

Auction archive: Lot number 24
Auction:
Datum:
20 Oct 2020
Auction house:
Phillips
null
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