French Sculpture
including French-born artists
See also : Women artists Current art by women Gauguin Matisse Post war French art Klein Man and woman
Chronology : 1908 1959 1960 1970-1979 1990-1999 1997
See also : Women artists Current art by women Gauguin Matisse Post war French art Klein Man and woman
Chronology : 1908 1959 1960 1970-1979 1990-1999 1997
1897 Eve by Rodin
2008 SOLD for $ 19M including premium by Christie's
narrated in 2020
In 1880, when Rodin received the commission for the Porte de l'Enfer, he was already working on his Creation of Man which he exhibited at the 1881 Salon. This Adam after sin expresses supreme repentance, standing with his head down and dangling arms. Expecting a complement to the order, he proposes to adjoin the Gate with Adam and Eve in life size.
He is preparing his Eve au Rocher with a small plaster model. The modest position of the arms voluntarily annihilates the eroticism of nudity, which suits academic and religious traditions. The shape of the body carefully takes into account the anatomy of the muscles under the skin.
Rodin does not get the additional order. He drives out the primordial couple from his Hell and abandons his Eve. He takes up this theme in the mid-1890s for a life-size sculpture, with the same attitude and another woman. He wants perfection and does not understand why he has to rework the lines of the body with each new session. He did not know that his role model for the sinful woman had started a pregnancy.
On May 6, 2008, Christie's sold an Eve in the version without the rock for $ 19M including premium from a lower estimate of $ 9M, lot 15. This bronze 1.73 m high with brown patina was cast by François Rudier in 1897 with the inscription Première Epreuve.
In the following year the Balzac is refused by the Société des Gens de Lettres. The collector Auguste Pellerin wants to help Rodin and offers to buy the object of the scandal. Rodin prefers to wait. He keeps his Balzac and sells his Eve Première Epreuve to Pellerin.
He is preparing his Eve au Rocher with a small plaster model. The modest position of the arms voluntarily annihilates the eroticism of nudity, which suits academic and religious traditions. The shape of the body carefully takes into account the anatomy of the muscles under the skin.
Rodin does not get the additional order. He drives out the primordial couple from his Hell and abandons his Eve. He takes up this theme in the mid-1890s for a life-size sculpture, with the same attitude and another woman. He wants perfection and does not understand why he has to rework the lines of the body with each new session. He did not know that his role model for the sinful woman had started a pregnancy.
On May 6, 2008, Christie's sold an Eve in the version without the rock for $ 19M including premium from a lower estimate of $ 9M, lot 15. This bronze 1.73 m high with brown patina was cast by François Rudier in 1897 with the inscription Première Epreuve.
In the following year the Balzac is refused by the Société des Gens de Lettres. The collector Auguste Pellerin wants to help Rodin and offers to buy the object of the scandal. Rodin prefers to wait. He keeps his Balzac and sells his Eve Première Epreuve to Pellerin.
1902 The Idol of the Maison du Jouir
2015 SOLD for $ 31M including premium
Gauguin's resentment against the establishment was taking the form of insulting provocations. He left Tahiti where he was not any more finding an inspiration to his art and arrived in the Marquesas in September 1901. He soon retrieved the targets of his vituperation : the Catholic clergy and the gendarmes of the French Republic.
Gauguin blamed the Catholics for their hypocritical opposition to sexual freedom and rejoiced about the weaknesses of the prelates. He purchased a piece of land to the local bishop to build his home which he decorated as a temple to pornography under the complacently inscribed name Maison du Jouir (House of orgasm). He bought a young vahine, achieving to generate the total exasperation of the missionaries.
This exiled artist has humor. The best exhibition place in the Maison du Jouir is the door, visible from outside. Around August 1902, Gauguin installs two statues made by him in rosewood in native style. The man, Père Paillard (Father Debauchery), is a caricature of the bishop as a horned devil. The woman, Thérèse, is inspired by the gossip that the servant of the bishop was also his mistress.
On this phallic shaped statue 66 cm high, Thérèse is a nice woman, naked except for a loincloth. With her oversized head increasing her expressive feature, she is a transposition of primitive art to a Western subject. Although the intention of the artist was purely local, appealing beside him the laughers of Atuona, this artwork anticipates the interpretation of African and Oceanian figures by the artists of the twentieth century.
Thérèse is estimated $ 18M for sale by Christie's in New York on November 9, lot 5A. Its pendant Père Paillard is kept at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.
Gauguin blamed the Catholics for their hypocritical opposition to sexual freedom and rejoiced about the weaknesses of the prelates. He purchased a piece of land to the local bishop to build his home which he decorated as a temple to pornography under the complacently inscribed name Maison du Jouir (House of orgasm). He bought a young vahine, achieving to generate the total exasperation of the missionaries.
This exiled artist has humor. The best exhibition place in the Maison du Jouir is the door, visible from outside. Around August 1902, Gauguin installs two statues made by him in rosewood in native style. The man, Père Paillard (Father Debauchery), is a caricature of the bishop as a horned devil. The woman, Thérèse, is inspired by the gossip that the servant of the bishop was also his mistress.
On this phallic shaped statue 66 cm high, Thérèse is a nice woman, naked except for a loincloth. With her oversized head increasing her expressive feature, she is a transposition of primitive art to a Western subject. Although the intention of the artist was purely local, appealing beside him the laughers of Atuona, this artwork anticipates the interpretation of African and Oceanian figures by the artists of the twentieth century.
Thérèse is estimated $ 18M for sale by Christie's in New York on November 9, lot 5A. Its pendant Père Paillard is kept at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.
Paul Gauguin's Thérèse sells for $30,965,000 a #worldauctionrecord for a sculpture by the artist. pic.twitter.com/NuEf8SG0Ex
— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) November 10, 20151901-1903 The Triumph of Spring
2016 SOLD for $ 20.4M including premium
Auguste Rodin likes the vigorous bodies which he reproduces in high realism by kneading the earth. The Torso of Adèle, realized before 1880, displays the muscular curvature of a naked young woman. When he meets Camille Claudel, he expresses his new passion by providing a young man to his Adèle now complemented with her limbs and a head.
This first version of L'Eternel Printemps (The Eternal Spring) is carved in the mid 1880s. With the excuse of the reference to Dante in the Gates of Hell and the desire for a total art inspired by Beethoven, Rodin injects in this nude couple an intense erotic surge. The kneeling woman is embraced by the powerful young man. Mouths are joined in a kiss. The title positions the mad love outside the time of our civilizations while evoking the season of sap rising.
Rodin has marbles carved in single blocks by his workshop in response to customer orders. The first marble of The Eternal Spring is started in 1896. The group is now built against a rock which ensures the robustness of the outstretched arm.
The fifth marble of The Eternal Spring is commissioned in 1901 by a friend of Rainer Maria Rilke and completed in 1903, the year when the poet wrote an essay on Rodin. This sculpture 66 cm high and 80 cm long is weighing 154 Kg. It is estimated $ 8M for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 9, lot 17.
I invite you to watch the video shared by the auction house:
This first version of L'Eternel Printemps (The Eternal Spring) is carved in the mid 1880s. With the excuse of the reference to Dante in the Gates of Hell and the desire for a total art inspired by Beethoven, Rodin injects in this nude couple an intense erotic surge. The kneeling woman is embraced by the powerful young man. Mouths are joined in a kiss. The title positions the mad love outside the time of our civilizations while evoking the season of sap rising.
Rodin has marbles carved in single blocks by his workshop in response to customer orders. The first marble of The Eternal Spring is started in 1896. The group is now built against a rock which ensures the robustness of the outstretched arm.
The fifth marble of The Eternal Spring is commissioned in 1901 by a friend of Rainer Maria Rilke and completed in 1903, the year when the poet wrote an essay on Rodin. This sculpture 66 cm high and 80 cm long is weighing 154 Kg. It is estimated $ 8M for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 9, lot 17.
I invite you to watch the video shared by the auction house:
Rodin's Eternal Springtime - on offer this May in #SothebysImpMod https://t.co/fJInnZfclH #ImagineTheConversation pic.twitter.com/1GQxqHF8Ah
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) April 20, 2016
1908 Table Sculptures by Matisse
2018 SOLD for £ 15M including premium
Henri Matisse is one of the earliest artists to release the figurative arts from the realistic proportions of photography. He kneads the clay from 1899. His table sculptures allow him to watch the bold angles of view which will bring an expressive harmony to the disproportions. La Danse in 1909 is the spectacular culmination of this creative process. Matisse's clay nudes are to be compared to Meissonier's wax horses.
Matisse explores several paths in parallel including the pointillisme inspired by Signac and it is Fauvisme that raises its reputation in 1905. Soon afterward the first encounters of European artists with African tribal art convince him of the possibility to derogate from the forms of nature.
During his stays in Collioure Matisse frequently meets Maillol in Banyuls. Maillol endeavors to simplify the nude to achieve the purity in perfect proportions. They have complementary approaches that both release the nude from Rodin's muscular eroticism.
In 1907 in Collioure, Matisse designs Nu allongé I, 34 x 50 x 29 cm. The torsion of the body could evoke Rodin but the hypertrophied raised elbow announces a new style. This artwork will be nicknamed L'Aurore (dawn) by comparison of the robust attitude with the famous funerary marble by Michelangelo. In the same year his Nu bleu is a pictorial projection of the Nu allongé I. This painting will be often imitated by Picasso and inaugurates the lifelong competition between these two artists.
Matisse's priority is painting but he also makes bronzes, sparingly. During his lifetime only eleven bronzes of the Nu allongé I are cast, the last one being an artist's proof. They are distributed from 1908 to 1951 in no less than five different casts.
The first three bronzes were edited in Paris around 1908 by Bingen et Costenoble who were also working for Maillol. One of them is estimated £ 5M for sale by Phillips in London on March 8, lot 9. Two later copies had fetched a very high price at auction for their time : $ 8.4M by Christie's on November 9, 1999 for one of the two 1912 bronzes and $ 9.6M by Phillips on May 7, 2001 for one of the three 1930 bronzes.
Matisse explores several paths in parallel including the pointillisme inspired by Signac and it is Fauvisme that raises its reputation in 1905. Soon afterward the first encounters of European artists with African tribal art convince him of the possibility to derogate from the forms of nature.
During his stays in Collioure Matisse frequently meets Maillol in Banyuls. Maillol endeavors to simplify the nude to achieve the purity in perfect proportions. They have complementary approaches that both release the nude from Rodin's muscular eroticism.
In 1907 in Collioure, Matisse designs Nu allongé I, 34 x 50 x 29 cm. The torsion of the body could evoke Rodin but the hypertrophied raised elbow announces a new style. This artwork will be nicknamed L'Aurore (dawn) by comparison of the robust attitude with the famous funerary marble by Michelangelo. In the same year his Nu bleu is a pictorial projection of the Nu allongé I. This painting will be often imitated by Picasso and inaugurates the lifelong competition between these two artists.
Matisse's priority is painting but he also makes bronzes, sparingly. During his lifetime only eleven bronzes of the Nu allongé I are cast, the last one being an artist's proof. They are distributed from 1908 to 1951 in no less than five different casts.
The first three bronzes were edited in Paris around 1908 by Bingen et Costenoble who were also working for Maillol. One of them is estimated £ 5M for sale by Phillips in London on March 8, lot 9. Two later copies had fetched a very high price at auction for their time : $ 8.4M by Christie's on November 9, 1999 for one of the two 1912 bronzes and $ 9.6M by Phillips on May 7, 2001 for one of the three 1930 bronzes.
(1879-1881) posthumous > 1922 Study for a Rat d'Opéra
2015 SOLD for £ 15.8M including premium
Petite danseuse de quatorze ans is a sculpture by Degas edited posthumously by Hébrard in bronze with muslin skirt and satin hair ribbon.
A copy from this edition was sold for £ 13.3M including premium by Sotheby's on February 3, 2009.
Another copy was sold for £ 7M before fees by Sotheby's on June 27, 2000. It was a star lot at Christie's on November 1, 2011 but could not reach its very expensive estimate. It comes back to Sotheby's in London on June 24, lot 14 more reasonably estimated £ 10M.
I republish below my 2011 discussion :
Original artist with an uneasy temper, Edgar Degas was one of the most innovative graphic artists of the nineteenth century. He knew that he was close to the Impressionists and appreciated their rejection of classicism. His own creative process was very complex, as shown in the example below.
In 1879, Marie draws the attention of the artist. Aged 14, this "petit rat d'Opéra" is an ungrateful teenager, far from physiological maturity, with awkward gestures, but already attracted to her future career as a dancer (which ended before it was to start when she was fired from the dance school for repeated absences).
Degas was a painter, draftsman, sculptor, photographer, printer, but his great art was oil and pastel. He used drawing and sculpture like sketches.
On his first sculpture of Marie, 74 cm high, the girl is naked. This makes sense since the artist wants to study the movements of her body. This is not enough for him. He realized another larger statue in painted wax, a little over 1 m, in the same position, with the unconventional idea to equip it with a dancing dress in cloth.
After much hesitation, Degas shows his Petite danseuse de quatorze ans at the Impressionist exhibition of 1881. After this unique event and until his death in 1917, no sculpture of the master will be exhibited.
Degas considered that his waxes were too fragile for preparing bronze casts. From 1922 to 1938, Hébrard can now publish the sculptures found in Degas's studio. By its realism that does not reject ugliness, the Petite danseuse will be considered as a key work of modern sculpture.
I invite you to watch the video shared in 2015 by Sotheby's :
A copy from this edition was sold for £ 13.3M including premium by Sotheby's on February 3, 2009.
Another copy was sold for £ 7M before fees by Sotheby's on June 27, 2000. It was a star lot at Christie's on November 1, 2011 but could not reach its very expensive estimate. It comes back to Sotheby's in London on June 24, lot 14 more reasonably estimated £ 10M.
I republish below my 2011 discussion :
Original artist with an uneasy temper, Edgar Degas was one of the most innovative graphic artists of the nineteenth century. He knew that he was close to the Impressionists and appreciated their rejection of classicism. His own creative process was very complex, as shown in the example below.
In 1879, Marie draws the attention of the artist. Aged 14, this "petit rat d'Opéra" is an ungrateful teenager, far from physiological maturity, with awkward gestures, but already attracted to her future career as a dancer (which ended before it was to start when she was fired from the dance school for repeated absences).
Degas was a painter, draftsman, sculptor, photographer, printer, but his great art was oil and pastel. He used drawing and sculpture like sketches.
On his first sculpture of Marie, 74 cm high, the girl is naked. This makes sense since the artist wants to study the movements of her body. This is not enough for him. He realized another larger statue in painted wax, a little over 1 m, in the same position, with the unconventional idea to equip it with a dancing dress in cloth.
After much hesitation, Degas shows his Petite danseuse de quatorze ans at the Impressionist exhibition of 1881. After this unique event and until his death in 1917, no sculpture of the master will be exhibited.
Degas considered that his waxes were too fragile for preparing bronze casts. From 1922 to 1938, Hébrard can now publish the sculptures found in Degas's studio. By its realism that does not reject ugliness, the Petite danseuse will be considered as a key work of modern sculpture.
I invite you to watch the video shared in 2015 by Sotheby's :
1959 The Incoming of Sponges into Art
2013 SOLD 22 M$ including premium
The cosmographic approach by Yves Klein is a patchwork of series carefully numbered behind a prefix, culminating in the final months of his short life in a sublime synthesis of universe, elements and life.
The sponge is an essential step in his progress. It has the great quality in the mind of the artist to immediately imbibe the beautiful IKB, the "Klein blue." The working tool is now by itself a piece of art that can evoke figurative themes through its rough texture.
The series of Sculptures Eponges (SE) was developed in 1959. SE 168 is an extraordinary specimen in the shape of a gigantic flower.
An accumulation of IKB sponges embellished with voids and cracks form the flower, mounted on a winding metal rod stuck in a stone base to ensure stability. This flower looks as slight as a Calder mobile.
It is for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 14. Here is the link to the catalog. In its exceptional size, 1.13 m high overall, this artwork is so rare that auctioneer did not dare to publish an estimate.
SE should not be confused with the Reliefs Eponges (RE), of which the most outstanding were made in the following year.
In the RE, Klein opted for the cosmic meaning. The shape of a sponge is an asteroid which was never altered by an atmosphere. They are placed on a flat surface and the whole is accepting other Klein basic colors. RE 22, in pink, was sold for £ 23.5 million including premium at Christie's on 27 June 2012.
POST SALE COMMENT
This outstanding composition with sponges by Klein was sold $ 22M including premium.
The sponge is an essential step in his progress. It has the great quality in the mind of the artist to immediately imbibe the beautiful IKB, the "Klein blue." The working tool is now by itself a piece of art that can evoke figurative themes through its rough texture.
The series of Sculptures Eponges (SE) was developed in 1959. SE 168 is an extraordinary specimen in the shape of a gigantic flower.
An accumulation of IKB sponges embellished with voids and cracks form the flower, mounted on a winding metal rod stuck in a stone base to ensure stability. This flower looks as slight as a Calder mobile.
It is for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 14. Here is the link to the catalog. In its exceptional size, 1.13 m high overall, this artwork is so rare that auctioneer did not dare to publish an estimate.
SE should not be confused with the Reliefs Eponges (RE), of which the most outstanding were made in the following year.
In the RE, Klein opted for the cosmic meaning. The shape of a sponge is an asteroid which was never altered by an atmosphere. They are placed on a flat surface and the whole is accepting other Klein basic colors. RE 22, in pink, was sold for £ 23.5 million including premium at Christie's on 27 June 2012.
POST SALE COMMENT
This outstanding composition with sponges by Klein was sold $ 22M including premium.
1960 The Mystery of the Pink Room
2012 SOLD 23.5 M£ including premium
The art of Klein was mystical. His monochromes were the elements of a trinity. The colors he selected were the IKB intense blue, the madder pink and gold, more expressive than the three primary colors of Chevreul.
He spreads his color on canvas. Suddenly, like Kandinsky discovering by chance (according to legend) that he had just invented abstract art, Klein is rising to the rank of a fundamental artistic figure a sponge soaked with paint which he just used.
Thus begins around 1959 the series of RE (Reliefs Eponges or Sponge Reliefs) by Yves Klein: transforming his panels into sculpture, the artist dispositions sponges and pebbles as a set that remains beautifully monochrome.
He then creates a new universe full of these strange figures pushing him in the following of the mineral world of Tanguy. But Tanguy died in 1955, and the space conquest had meanwhile started with its imaginary craters and lifeless rocks.
Fontana did not miss it. He briefly owned a blue sponge relief of 1959, 104 x 105 x 10 cm, which is now estimated £ 6M, for sale by Christie's in London on June 27. Here is the link to the catalog.
In 1961 in Krefeld, an exhibition demonstrates the clash of colors of Klein's trinity by ably attributing a different room to each color. Two artworks made in 1960 are particularly noticed.
The blue room is dominated by Archisponge, 200 x 165 cm, which was sold $ 21.4 million including premium at Sotheby's on November 11, 2008. The catalog did not indicate the thickness.
In the same next sale as above, on June 27 in London, Christie's sells the masterpiece of the pink room, 199 x 153 x 16 cm. Here is the link to the catalog. The estimate is not published.
Its mysterious title, Le Rose du Bleu, does not doubt the purity of the madder pigment but indicates that the artist attempts a unified vision of his Pink with the immaterial symbol of his basic Blue.
Both artworks for the next sale are shown in the film shared by Christie's Multimedia.
POST SALE COMMENT
Very good results for both Sponge Reliefs: £ 23.5 million including premium for the pink, and £ 7.7 million including premium for the blue.
He spreads his color on canvas. Suddenly, like Kandinsky discovering by chance (according to legend) that he had just invented abstract art, Klein is rising to the rank of a fundamental artistic figure a sponge soaked with paint which he just used.
Thus begins around 1959 the series of RE (Reliefs Eponges or Sponge Reliefs) by Yves Klein: transforming his panels into sculpture, the artist dispositions sponges and pebbles as a set that remains beautifully monochrome.
He then creates a new universe full of these strange figures pushing him in the following of the mineral world of Tanguy. But Tanguy died in 1955, and the space conquest had meanwhile started with its imaginary craters and lifeless rocks.
Fontana did not miss it. He briefly owned a blue sponge relief of 1959, 104 x 105 x 10 cm, which is now estimated £ 6M, for sale by Christie's in London on June 27. Here is the link to the catalog.
In 1961 in Krefeld, an exhibition demonstrates the clash of colors of Klein's trinity by ably attributing a different room to each color. Two artworks made in 1960 are particularly noticed.
The blue room is dominated by Archisponge, 200 x 165 cm, which was sold $ 21.4 million including premium at Sotheby's on November 11, 2008. The catalog did not indicate the thickness.
In the same next sale as above, on June 27 in London, Christie's sells the masterpiece of the pink room, 199 x 153 x 16 cm. Here is the link to the catalog. The estimate is not published.
Its mysterious title, Le Rose du Bleu, does not doubt the purity of the madder pigment but indicates that the artist attempts a unified vision of his Pink with the immaterial symbol of his basic Blue.
Both artworks for the next sale are shown in the film shared by Christie's Multimedia.
POST SALE COMMENT
Very good results for both Sponge Reliefs: £ 23.5 million including premium for the pink, and £ 7.7 million including premium for the blue.
(1930) - 1978 The Lengthy Creation of Matisse's Back
2010 SOLD 49 M$ including premium
The art market has a passion for the sculpture of the twentieth century: Brancusi, Modigliani, Giacometti, Moore, and now Marini. The sale on November 3 by Christie's in New York of a strange masterpiece of Matisse is an event. The lot is estimated $ 25M.
In 1906, the artist designs an original theme of sculpture: a nude woman standing, life size, seen from behind, leaning against a wall. The subject fascinated him to such a degree that he created three further versions, in 1913, 1916 and 1930. Psychoanalysts could probably tell us why the sculpted woman is liked by Matisse when she turns her back.
These four naked Backs are changing from realism to stylization, from flexibility to a balance of the masses. The last state is broad and symmetrical, the body barred from head to buttocks by a vertical braid that resembles the tail of a heavy horse.
Twelve bronzes were published from each of the four plasters between 1948 and 1981. The piece for sale by Christie's is a bronze of the last state, 189 cm high, with brown patina, cast in 1978, the penultimate of this model to be still in private hands. It is shown on the Reuters news shared by Artdaily.
POST SALE COMMENT
The meeting of Henri Matisse with the Art Déco style has generated a very high price: $ 49M including premium. The fact that this original edition is largely posthumous has not hampered the buyers.
In 1906, the artist designs an original theme of sculpture: a nude woman standing, life size, seen from behind, leaning against a wall. The subject fascinated him to such a degree that he created three further versions, in 1913, 1916 and 1930. Psychoanalysts could probably tell us why the sculpted woman is liked by Matisse when she turns her back.
These four naked Backs are changing from realism to stylization, from flexibility to a balance of the masses. The last state is broad and symmetrical, the body barred from head to buttocks by a vertical braid that resembles the tail of a heavy horse.
Twelve bronzes were published from each of the four plasters between 1948 and 1981. The piece for sale by Christie's is a bronze of the last state, 189 cm high, with brown patina, cast in 1978, the penultimate of this model to be still in private hands. It is shown on the Reuters news shared by Artdaily.
POST SALE COMMENT
The meeting of Henri Matisse with the Art Déco style has generated a very high price: $ 49M including premium. The fact that this original edition is largely posthumous has not hampered the buyers.
1997 Maman Long Legs
2019 SOLD for $ 32M including premium
Louise Bourgeois desired to interpret her relationship with her own parents, generating a suffering that she appeased by her art at the borderline of sexual provocation. From 1951 to 1980 she tries a psychoanalysis. It is a failure : she considers that Freud does not propose anything for the artists.
In 1994 she builds a small steel spider 28 cm high which carries marble eggs in a bag under its body. This symbol of maternity breaks with the artist's earlier assimilation of the spider with a prostitute. This sculpture, one of the first by Bourgeois on this theme, passed at Sotheby's on November 11, 2015 against a lower estimate of $ 4M.
In the following year, at the age of 84, she suddenly understands that the spider's maternal function will solve her fantasies. She sculpts new steel spiders and edits them in bronze, in various configurations : lowered body for climbing on the wall or raised on its tall thin legs.
The perimeter of the legs is the safety zone offered by the mother to her offspring. The comparison with the Lupa Capitolina suckling Romulus and Remus is relevant. The spiders of Louise Bourgeois personify her own mother, too frail but intensely protective. The gigantic dimension of the sculptures, culminating in 1999 with a 10 m high Maman, solves this contradiction. Maman carries her eggs as in the original spider five years earlier.
A spider 3.26 m high on a 7.56 x 7.06 m overall perimeter designed in 1996 was sculpted in steel and cast in bronze in 1997 in six copies plus one artist's proof and one variant in bronze. The number 3/6 was sold for $ 28M including premium by Christie's on November 10, 2015. The 2/6 is estimated $ 25M for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15, lot 21 B.
In 1994 she builds a small steel spider 28 cm high which carries marble eggs in a bag under its body. This symbol of maternity breaks with the artist's earlier assimilation of the spider with a prostitute. This sculpture, one of the first by Bourgeois on this theme, passed at Sotheby's on November 11, 2015 against a lower estimate of $ 4M.
In the following year, at the age of 84, she suddenly understands that the spider's maternal function will solve her fantasies. She sculpts new steel spiders and edits them in bronze, in various configurations : lowered body for climbing on the wall or raised on its tall thin legs.
The perimeter of the legs is the safety zone offered by the mother to her offspring. The comparison with the Lupa Capitolina suckling Romulus and Remus is relevant. The spiders of Louise Bourgeois personify her own mother, too frail but intensely protective. The gigantic dimension of the sculptures, culminating in 1999 with a 10 m high Maman, solves this contradiction. Maman carries her eggs as in the original spider five years earlier.
A spider 3.26 m high on a 7.56 x 7.06 m overall perimeter designed in 1996 was sculpted in steel and cast in bronze in 1997 in six copies plus one artist's proof and one variant in bronze. The number 3/6 was sold for $ 28M including premium by Christie's on November 10, 2015. The 2/6 is estimated $ 25M for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15, lot 21 B.
1997 The Female Spider
2015 SOLD for $ 28M including premium
Louise Bourgeois left many writings about her own art but it remains difficult to find the key. The relationship between sex and family, the position of the child within the family unit, are the highly traumatic guides to her creativity. Until 98 years old, she will be an activist in support to all the sexual minorities.
She is already an octogenarian when she develops the theme of the spider. By entitling Maman her most mesmerizing spiders, she seems to clarify her most intimate desire but in reality she blurs it with complacency.
The world of a real spider is certainly of high complexity. It (she) is patient, steady in the center of her web which she builds and efficiently repairs after a destruction. The polygon of her eight legs offers a shelter for her loved ones, but she is also a fierce predator to the insects. Her small size makes her vulnerable but the artist will enlarge it to make her the towering star of a dehumanized parallel universe.
The spider is not a vertebrate and her behavioral psychology is inaccessible. She amazed those who approached her since the mythological times. By choosing this beast as a symbol of motherhood, Louise Bourgeois is not an artist of animals but indeed a highly disturbing surrealist artist in the line of Wifredo Lam.
Within her old age, Louise Bourgeois remained hypersensitive to sexual ambiguity and sexual promiscuity. On October 15, 2015, Sotheby's sold for £ 1.2M including premium a showcase realized in 2001 titled Mother and child, exhibiting a limp infant on the nude torso of a woman like some externalization of pregnancy. The carefully carved body of Bourgeois's spiders is certainly another female carnal and Freudian symbol.
A spider 6.68 x 6.33 m for 3.38 m high cast in 1996 was sold for $ 10.7 million including premium by Christie's in New York on November 8, 2011. On November 10, the same auction house offers another even wider variant also in bronze, 7.56 x 7.06 x 3.26 m, executed in 1997, lot 10B.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Christie's.
She is already an octogenarian when she develops the theme of the spider. By entitling Maman her most mesmerizing spiders, she seems to clarify her most intimate desire but in reality she blurs it with complacency.
The world of a real spider is certainly of high complexity. It (she) is patient, steady in the center of her web which she builds and efficiently repairs after a destruction. The polygon of her eight legs offers a shelter for her loved ones, but she is also a fierce predator to the insects. Her small size makes her vulnerable but the artist will enlarge it to make her the towering star of a dehumanized parallel universe.
The spider is not a vertebrate and her behavioral psychology is inaccessible. She amazed those who approached her since the mythological times. By choosing this beast as a symbol of motherhood, Louise Bourgeois is not an artist of animals but indeed a highly disturbing surrealist artist in the line of Wifredo Lam.
Within her old age, Louise Bourgeois remained hypersensitive to sexual ambiguity and sexual promiscuity. On October 15, 2015, Sotheby's sold for £ 1.2M including premium a showcase realized in 2001 titled Mother and child, exhibiting a limp infant on the nude torso of a woman like some externalization of pregnancy. The carefully carved body of Bourgeois's spiders is certainly another female carnal and Freudian symbol.
A spider 6.68 x 6.33 m for 3.38 m high cast in 1996 was sold for $ 10.7 million including premium by Christie's in New York on November 8, 2011. On November 10, the same auction house offers another even wider variant also in bronze, 7.56 x 7.06 x 3.26 m, executed in 1997, lot 10B.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Christie's.
