Alberto Giacometti Flashcards
Four Inspirations/Influences
His FATHER - post-Impressionist painter.
AFRICAN AND ORIENTAL artwork, especially ANCIENT EGYPT.
- stylized figures, FIXED EXPRESSIONS AND ELONGATED SILHOUETTES
Surrealism.
- Involved in Surrealist movement
- Later expelled from the movement due to ’realistic’ works
- Surrealist principles continued as an important part in his artistic process, including DISTORTED TREATMENT OF THE FIGURE
Art based on images that arrived fully formed in his head, like DREAMS (Surrealism), or MEMORIES of places and figures.
Ideas/Intentions
REPRESENTING THE HUMAN FIGURE IN A CONVINCING ILLUSION OF REAL SPACE, so that viewers might share his own sense of distance from the subject.
- Led to whittling the figures down to the slenderest proportions.
- Portraying a RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE BODY AND SPACE that negotiates the parallel existence of life and death
- Related to EXISTENTIALISM (idea of humanity’s struggle to function in a world that is fundamentally absurd and meaningless) AFTER WWII.
- Pared down and isolated figures powerfully captured the tone of anxiety, alienation and loneliness of Existentialism
- The SUFFERING HUMAN FIGURE (skeletal, exhaustion, failure and guilt) a popular symbol of POST-WAR TRAUMA, and defined a new way of thinking about humanity after the atrocities of war.
Giacometti did not link his work to any trend in philosophy or any art movement. Rather, he CONVEYED HIS FEELINGS IN HIS SCULPTURES, saying: “Mostly I work for the sake of emotions I experience when I create.”
- Not interested in reproducing the outward appearance of his models - wanted to lay bare his emotional pain and the human condition full of suffering.
Process - Relationships between body and space - size
EARLY FIGURES WERE VERY SMALL to reflect the distance between the artist and model.
AFTER WWII, FIGURES WERE EXTREMELY TALL AND SLENDER. These sculptures were subject to his individual viewing experience - between an imaginary yet real space.
Process - Materials
PLASTER, CATING OR BRONZE materials to shape an object.
Although many of his sculptures were eventually cast in bronze (enabling large works up to 2m high), PREFERRED TO WORK IN CLAY OR PLASTER, MATERIALS WHICH HE COULD FORM AND SHAPE WITH HIS WON HANDS
Process
OBSESSIVE PROCESS OF MODELLING IN CLAY, REVISING, REWORKING AND REDUCING HIS FIGURES, EVEN RESTARTING WORKS AGAIN AND AGAINO until he felt they accurately represented his vision of the subject’s essence before producing the final mould for the bronze.
THE SURFACE OF THE BRONZE CASTING RETAIN THE PRINTS OF GIACOMETTI’S HANDS as he touched the clay. Tormented surfaces with refreshing materiality
MASTERFUL ARTIFICIAL PATINATION OF THE BRONZE AND INTRICATE COLOUR SHADINGS FROM A WARN OCHRE TO COOL TINTS OF GREEN.
EXPLORATION OF AN ELEMENTAL BODY, ITS PLACEMENT IN SPACE, AND ITS RELATIONSHIP WITH THE PLINTH
‘Man Pointing’, 1947 - Influences/Inspirations
Created after WWII
Previous influences - Egyptian artworks, Surrealism, depicting emotions and the essence of the human condition (Extentialism)
‘Man Pointing’, 1947 - Ideas/Intentions
Concern with capturing movement as well as stillness.
- transcribing movement into immobility
Elongated figure reaching out into the void → transient existence in the vast expanse of the universe.
Slim and fragile figure gives a sense of vulnerability, emptiness and loneliness.
Figure occupies a bare space - no context for what he points to, or why.
‘Man Pointing’, 1947 - Process
Manipulating wax and plaster then cast in bronze.
Created in one night
The surface is rough from the artist’s finger impressions as if charred or corroded.
It is one of the few bronzes to have been hand painted by the artist
‘The Chariot’, 1950 - Influences/Inspirations
Memory of a “sparkling pharmacy cart” he saw when briefly hospitalized.
“I saw the sculpture before me as if already done.” (dream/vision, Surrealism).
Inspired by antiquity, including an Egyptian chariot he had seen in a museum.
‘The Chariot’, 1950 - Ideas/Intentions
Exploring the notions of movement and stasis. Figure appears poised in precarious equilibrium - perpetually suspended between movement and stasis, advance and retreat.
Desire to position a figure in empty space - enhanced visibility and a precise positioning relative to the floor
‘The Chariot’, 1950 - Process
An edition of six.
Painted bronze on a wood base.
The entire sculpture, figure and base, stands nearly five feet high.