Constantin Brâncuși
Constantin Brancusi [ Constantine brɨŋkuʃʲ ] ( *, 19th February 1876 in Hobita ; † 16th March 1957 in Paris ) is a Romanian-French was sculptor of Modern and photographer of his works in the environment of his studio. Brâncuși, who lived and worked in Paris from 1904 after attending the Bucharest Art Academy , is one of the formative sculptors of the 20th century, who, along with Auguste Rodin , whom the artist knew and admired, was one of the sculptors had a lasting influence by breaking with the realistic reproduction of objects through reduction. After a traditional academic start, his individual style emerged from 1907, which was influenced by African and Romanian folk art.
Brâncuși's sculptural works in bronze , marble , wood and plaster often show abstract egg-shaped heads and flying birds; they are attributed to the avant-garde in the visual arts . He realized only a few subjects, which he varied in the tendency of Cubism , with which he came into contact from 1910. With the three-part war memorial in Târgu Jiu from 1938, he achieved the fusion of architecture and sculpture.
Life
Childhood and studies
Constantin Brâncuși was born on February 19, 1876 in Hobița from the second marriage of Nicolae Brâncuși (* 1831; † unknown) and his wife Maria Deaconescu (* 1852; † 1919). The father was a wealthy man who administered the lands around the Tismana monastery. He already had three sons from his first marriage and two sons from his second marriage, as well as the later-born daughter Eufrosina, who was only born after his death. According to its own information, Brâncuși attended primary school in Peștișani from 1884 to 1887. In 1887 he ran away from home, reached Târgu Jiu at the end of March and initially worked for a few months for a dyer named Moscu, where he learned how to work with vegetable dyes and to dye wool for making carpets. He then worked as a waiter in a café, left the city in 1888 and spent some time in Peştişani with his half-brother Neneal Ion, who ran a pub. In 1889 Brâncuși moved to Craiova , worked in a grocery store and in September 1892 moved to the neighboring town of Slatina , where he found a job with a widowed shopkeeper.
From 1894 Brâncuși studied at the arts and crafts school in Craiova, which he attended until 1898. He then took courses at the Art Academy in Bucharest ; In the entrance examination he had made a charcoal drawing after a plaster figure depicting Laocoon , which he modeled in clay in 1900 and executed as plaster of paris. After he had been postponed from being drafted into military service in 1898, he had to provide proof of continuing studies twice the following year. When he did not respond to his draft in 1901, he was declared a conscientious objector. In 1902 he received his diploma; however, a certificate authorized him to continue his studies in the academy's studio. On April 1, 1902, Brâncuși was convened; However, due to his diploma, he only had to serve one year instead of the required three years. With the help of his friend, the painter Jean Alexandru Steriadi , whose father was an administrative officer and who had put in a good word for the young sculptor, Brâncuși was able to get this year over with sick leave and special leave. One of his first works in 1903 was a traditional plaster design for a monument to the doctor and general Carol Davila, which was cast in bronze a few years later and set up in front of the military hospital in Bucharest. In the same year he set out on foot for Paris ; he reached the city on July 14, 1904, the national holiday in France, after stops in Vienna , Munich - where he worked for a while - and Langres .
Studies in Paris and first exhibitions
In the French capital, Brâncuși initially earned his living as a dishwasher in the Brasserie Chartier. Initially he lived in Cité Concorde No. 9 and in March 1905 moved into an attic at Place de la Bourse No. 10. Due to financial difficulties, he took a job as an altar boy in the Romanian Orthodox Church in Rue Jean-de for the Easter period -Beauvais at. On June 23, Brâncuși received after passing an examination and through the mediation of the State Council and a Romanian envoy a study permit at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris, where he studied until 1907 in the sculpture class with Antonin Mercié (1845-1916) . On October 27th, Brâncuși had to leave his rat-infested attic apartment and moved to Place Dauphine no.16. With the plaster sculptures L'Enfant (The Child) and L'Orgeuil (The Pride) , he participated in exhibitions for the first time in 1906 Salon of the Societé nationale des beaux-arts and the Salon d'Automne . At a further exhibition of the salon of the Societé nationale des beaux-arts, Brâncuși showed four of his works - the bronze Portrait de Nicolae Drascu as well as the plaster Le Supplice (Die Qual) and two children's heads Tête d'enfant . There he met Auguste Rodin , who exhibited his work L'Homme qui marche (The Stride) from 1878.
First studios in Paris
In 1907, Brâncuși left the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts and initially worked for Auguste Rodin in the spring. After working in his studio for a month, he summed up: “Il ne pousse rien à l'ombre des grands arbres” (“Nothing grows in the shade of large trees”) and gave up his work there. On April 18, at the intercession of the Romanian painter Ștefan Popescu, he received an order for a cemetery monument that the widow of a Petro Stanescu wanted to have erected for her husband in the Dumbrava cemetery in Buzău , Romania. Since Brâncuși planned a two-meter-high pedestal for the bust of the deceased for this tomb, he needed a studio on the ground floor due to the size of the work and found it in March 1908 at 54 Rue du Montparnasse, in the neighborhood of the American painter and photographer Edward Steichen . He lived and worked there until October 10, 1916. That year Brâncuși exhibited in the Salon d'Automne and met the Baroness Renée Frachon, who gave him several meetings between January 1, 1908 and 1910 for the sculptures La Muse endormie I (The slumbering Muse I) and La Baronne R. F. (The Baroness R. F.) were the models .
From 1908, a close friendship developed in Paris with Henri Matisse and Fernand Léger , Marcel Duchamp , Henri Rousseau , Alexander Archipenko and Amedeo Modigliani , whom Brâncuși had met in 1909 through the art collector Paul Alexandre and who portrayed him in Livorno that same year .
In 1910, Brâncuși met Margit Pogány, a Hungarian painter who was studying in Paris at the time and whom he portrayed in the white marble sculpture Mademoiselle Pogány I from 1912. Pogány often commuted between Budapest and Paris, where she always stayed in a pension that the sculptor also frequented. Brâncuși, who was a staunch bachelor, had an affair with her that ended in a long friendship, as letters from 1911 to 1937 attest.
In 1911, the commissioned work Le Baiser (The Kiss) from 1909 was installed on the grave of Tanioucha Rashewskaia, who had committed suicide as a result of an unhappy marriage, at the Montparnasse Cemetery . The sculptor engraved the words “Tanioucha Rashewskaia, born on April 6, 1887, died on November 22, 1910, dear, lovable, loved” in Cyrillic letters in the base of the tomb and planted ivy , a plant for which the artist one Possessed preference, at the foot of the pedestal.
On May 15, 1912, Brâncuși moved into a second studio at 47 Rue de Montparnasse near his first studio across the street, where Margit Pogány was his model for Mademoiselle Pogány I marble . With Fernand Léger and Marcel Duchamp, he visited the air show in the Parisian Grand Palais that autumn , where Brâncuși exclaimed in admiration in front of a propeller: “This is a sculpture! From now on, no sculpture should be inferior to this. ”In response to Brâncuşi's idea of a perfectly modern form, Duchamp remarked in view of the technical innovation:“ Painting is over. Who could do anything better than this propeller? Say, can you do something like that? "
Given the perfect industrial shape, the visit had a similar effect on the group as that of the African masks on Pablo Picasso a little earlier . Brâncuși's polished sculptures approached the industrial form, Duchamp gave up painting and created his first ready-made Roue de bicyclette ( bicycle wheel ) , while Léger dealt with the theory of how art can be brought into the state, the beauty of Reach machines.
Participation in artist meetings
From the years 1912/13 Brâncuși participated in various meetings. For example, he took part in the “Diners de Passy ” in the Maison de Balzac - the circle around the writer Guillaume Apollinaire in Rue Raynouard - as well as in meetings with the artists of the “ Puteaux Group ”. At one of these meetings, the sculptor Jeanne Augustine met Adrienne Lohy and was on friendly terms with her. Lohy, who called Brâncuși "Papa", married Fernand Léger in December 1919. He also took part in the “Tuesday meetings” around the poet Paul Fort at the artists' meeting place La Closerie des Lilas , where Fernand Léger, Blaise Cendrars , Jean Cocteau , Erik Satie and later, around 1918, Germaine Tailleferre and the other composers of the Groupe des Six such as Arthur Honegger , Darius Milhaud , Georges Auric , Francis Poulenc and Louis Durey .
Works on the Armory Show
Arthur B. Davies , Walt Kuhn and Walter Pach came to Paris in December to look for works of art in the run-up to preparations for the large Armory Show that was to take place in New York . They asked Brâncuși for four sculptures for the exhibition: Une Muse (A Muse) , 1912, marble, La Muse endormie I (The slumbering Muse I) , 1909, marble; Mademoiselle Pogány I , 1912, plaster; and Le Baiser (The Kiss) , 1912, Stein.
On February 17, 1913, the Armory Show opened; Brâncuși was involved with the works mentioned in the exhibition, which took place until March 15, 1913 and was then shown in Chicago and Boston . In the same year he met Henri Gaudier-Brzeska and the following year he had his first solo exhibition with eight works in the gallery 291 of the well-known photographer and gallery owner Alfred Stieglitz , including Maïastra from 1911 and Mademoiselle Pogány from 1912. The selection of works was made by Edward Steichen The shipping of the work was paid for by the art collector couple Agnes and Eugene Meyer , who were to become lifelong friends of the artist.
First World War
After the outbreak of World War I in July 1914, Brâncuși stayed in Paris as a Romanian citizen. In August 1914 he went to Voulangis with his friend Steichens to have headgear, gloves and stockings knitted for the soldiers from the wool he had collected. He also made his studio available to the Red Cross . American artists, including Edward Steichen, had left Paris since the beginning of the war; The French followed in 1915, including Francis Picabia , Albert Gleizes , Jean Crotti and Marcel Duchamp. Brâncuși donated some works for an exhibition opened on December 28th in the Bernheim-Jeune gallery on 15 Boulevard de la Madeleine for the benefit of Polish artists who had become victims of the war. Other donors were Pierre-Auguste Renoir , Auguste Rodin , Pierre Bonnard , Antoine Bourdelle , Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso .
At the beginning of 1916 Brâncuși rented a new, more spacious studio at Impasse Ronsin No. 8, where he also set up an apartment. He also kept his studio on Rue de Montparnasse for a while. The first success that Brâncuși had achieved through the exhibition at the Armory Show in 1913 in the United States was achieved in 1916 with the purchase of the marble head Le Nouveau-Né I (1916) by Marius de Zayas founded in October 1915 and by Agnes E. Meyer opened Modern Gallery underpinned. In the same year, Brâncuși refused military service and was finally released from service on November 8, 1917.
Quarrels about Princesse X , participation in the Dada festival
Brâncuși's sculpture Princesse X , a work from 1916, was turned down by the Salon des Indépendants in January 1920 after Henri Matisse exclaimed in view of the motif: “Look, a phallus .” Paul Signac , then president of the salon, Brâncuși said "that he was in danger of getting into trouble with the police superintendent", whereupon Brâncuși wanted to raise an objection to the police station and Fernand Léger knew how to calm him down. Instead, the sculpture L'Oiseau d'or from 1919 was given a place of honor in the exhibition.
Although Brâncuși had been friends with the Dadaists Tristan Tzara , Francis Picabia and Marcel Duchamp since 1921 , he always remained on the fringes of the Dada movement , but attended André Breton's reading of Picabia's Cannibale Manifesto at the Théâtre de l'Œuvre , “with one person standing high up on a ladder 'Dada, dada, I am dada!' screamed. The audience bombarded Breton with tomatoes and shouted: 'Stop it, stop it!' ”Together with Léger, the artist took part in the Dada festival in Paris on May 26, 1920, where he signed the manifesto Contre cubisme, contre dadaisme . In the same year an Endless Column Brâncușis was set up in Edward Steichen's garden in Voulangis .
Encounter with Man Ray
In 1921, Brâncuși visited Milan , Naples , Romania, Prague and Belgium between May 25 and June 21 , took a two-week trip to Corsica with Raymond Radiguet and befriended Jean Cocteau and Erik Satie . He often exchanged thoughts and worries with Satie, and both were fascinated by the subject of Socrates , which was expressed in their works: in Satie's symphonic drama La Mort de Socrate and in the sculpture Sokrate (Socrates) , made in honor of Satie , 1922, by Brâncuși, who “liked to call the musician 'Socrates brother'.” It was the year in which Brâncuși, who was always dissatisfied with the photographs of his sculptures, met Man Ray ; In his book Autoportrait he reported that he had visited Brâncuși to photograph him, but the sculptor had placed no value on publication. What interested him were good photographs of his works. So far, wrote Man Ray, he had been disappointed by the few pictures he had seen, such as a photograph of Mademoiselle Pogány marble from the exhibition on the New York Armory Show that Stieglitz had sent him. Only he [Brâncuși] is able to photograph his sculptures.
First publication on Brâncuși
In the fall of 1921 a number of the Little Review was published dedicated to Brâncuși - a magazine that also had a gallery called The Little Review Gallery in New York at 66 Fifth Avenue - with the inscription "Brancusi number" on red wrapper. It was edited by Margaret Anderson with the collaboration of Jean Cocteau, Jean Hugo, Guy Charles-Cros, Paul Morand , Francis Picabia and Ezra Pound , who in this issue published "the first important article about the sculptor (with twenty-four photo reproductions)", "Which, along with a later article in 'This Quarter', is undoubtedly the basic document for dating certain works."
1922 traveled Brâncuşi with the Irish-American beauty Eileen Lane, which introduced the sculptor as his daughter, to Romania and visited with her ski resort Sinaia and Pestisani, where he developed the potential project with regard to the establishment of a war memorial in Targu Jiu in attack took and visited the quarries in the area. The journey home led back with stays in Rome and Marseille . The following year a sculpture was created that bears Eileen's name.
In October 1923, the Irish-American lawyer and art collector John Quinn came to Paris incognito for about two weeks. Quinn, the sponsor of the Armory Show, got to know the works of Brâncuși there and acquired many of his works until his death, for example in 1914 a version of the sculpture Mademoiselle Pogány for 6,000 francs in Gallery 291 . At a golf game in Fontainebleau , to which Brâncuși had been invited, Quinn let the artist win, although he had never before had a club in hand. Brâncuși proudly presented the prize, a set of new golf clubs, on the wall of his studio for years. John Quinn died in 1924. Marcel Duchamp and Henri-Pierre Roché acquired 29 sculptures by the artist from Quinn's estate at Brâncuși's request, in order to avoid the market price falling if the offer was too large. He sold some works in an exhibition at the Brummer Gallery in New York; further sales followed gradually.
Illustrations in magazines, exhibitions in New York
In 1924 , the magazine Transatlantic Review, founded by Ford Madox Ford in the same year, published 64 blackboard illustrations and a poem by Brâncușis. He spent the summer in Saint-Raphaël , where he created the sculpture Le Crocodile (The Crocodile) , a "crocodile stamp", on the beach from washed up cork oak trunks .
In the magazine This Quarter , published in Paris by Ernest Walsh and Ethel Moorhead in 1925, the Art Supplement contained in the booklet published a series of 46 photo reproductions by Brâncuși, consisting of 37 dated photographs of works, four portraits of the sculptor and five drawings . Brâncuşi's nine aphorisms - “Brâncuşi's answers about direct carving, polishing and simplicity in art, as well as aphorisms for Irène Codreanu” - and a Histoire de brigands (robber's story) written by him were preceded by Brâncuşi's .
From January to March 1926, Brâncuși visited New York, as two exhibitions were held in the Wildenstein Gallery : the Exhibition of Trinational Art, French, British, American , on which he presented the four works Torse (Torso) , L'Oiseau (The Bird ) and two sculptures of Figure (FIG) exhibited, and from February 16 to March 3 permanent second solo exhibition of his works. Shortly before his departure, Brâncuși received an invitation to the official opening of an exhibition on January 7th at the Art Center in memory of John Quinn, who had died in July 1924. However, he could not see them because he did not arrive in New York by ship until January 28th. Before Brâncuși left New York on March 22, he made the acquaintance of the American architect William Lescaze in the Wildenstein Galleries and was invited by Béatrice Wood , a friend of Marcel Duchamp and Henri-Pierre Roché.
Increasing prominence as a sculptor
In May 1926 Brâncuși traveled to Antwerp , Belgium , where the group exhibition L'Art francais modern took place. In June of that year, Eugène Meyer expressed the desire to purchase the sculpture L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space) for $ 4,000 from the sculptor. Brâncuși himself brought this from Paris to New York, as an exhibition in the Brummer Gallery was dedicated to him in November of that year. He was stopped at the American customs control with the information that it was a piece of metal that was taxable. Brâncuși countered that it was a work of art and as such did not have to be taxed. As a result, a lengthy process about the sculpture took place, in which the question was whether the sculpture was subject to duty in the sense of a manufactured product or a work of art. The court decided the latter in 1928.
From 1927 to 1929 the American-Japanese sculptor Isamu Noguchi worked as an assistant in Brâncuși's Paris studio and was inspired by his work of reduced forms. In an essay about his various encounters with the sculptor, Noguchi reported the importance Brâncuși placed on the fact that every tool should be treated appropriately and with awe and patience. The axes and the almost 1.5-meter-long saw always had to be sanded so well that they were able to penetrate the wood with their own weight.
In December 1927, De Stijl magazine published three photographs of Brâncuși's works: Princesse (Princess) ; Sculpture pour aveugles (sculpture for the blind) and a photo of the artist, after she had pictured Negresse blonde (blonde negress) in her number 77 a year earlier . The artist group of the same name was founded in 1917 by Theo van Doesburg , whom the sculptor knew well, and Piet Mondrian .
In 1929 James Joyce - referred to Brâncuși by John Quinn and Ezra Pound - visited the sculptor in his studio and asked for a portrait drawing for a book publication. After Brâncuși had made several sketches, the writer chose three: a profile drawing, another in frontal view and an abstract drawing with a spiral and three verticals. These drawings were later printed on the dust jacket of Joyce's Tales Told of Shem and Shaun , a chapter in the forthcoming novel Finnegans Wake .
On February 11, 1930, Brâncuși signed two rental agreements. One for a medium-sized studio that was registered in the name of Marcel Duchamp and was now in his name, and another for a studio in the Ruche des Arts , the Beehive of the Arts, which was founded in 1902 by Alfred Boucher . Boucher had a pavilion called “La Chapelle” built on the free, wooded property, which served as a studio, and around thirty other studios in which artists such as Amedeo Modigliani , Chaim Soutine and Marc Chagall worked.
That year he met British concert pianist Vera Moore after the Tate Gallery of Modern Art collector and curator Jim Ede, who lived at Kettle's Yard , invited the sculptor to one of her concerts. In 1934 Moore gave birth to a son, John Moore, whom Brâncuși never recognized as his child.
Monument in Târgu Jiu, trips to India and New York
In 1936 Brâncuși received an order from the Maharajah of Indore , who had acquired the bronze bird in the room for the Temple de la Délivrance (Temple of Liberation) . Brâncuși was represented with L'Oiselet (The Little Bird) , 1929, for the Romanian pavilion at the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris . An initially planned column sans fin (endless column) in the garden of the pavilion was discarded for reasons of time. Between June and September 1937 the sculptor worked on a war memorial in Târgu Jiu . After a two-month stay in Paris, he traveled back to Romania at the beginning of November to observe the erection of the endless column belonging to the three-part ensemble . Other components of the monument are La Table du silence (The table of silence) and La Porte du baiser ( The gate of the kiss ) .
In early 1938, Brâncuși traveled to Indore via Bombay to work at the Temple de la Délivrance , but did not meet the Maharajah. A dignitary received him and let the sculptor live in the palace. He had a car and a chauffeur at his disposal, toured the country and cleaned the sculptures the Maharajah had bought in his studio. Due to the death of the Maharajah, the temple was no longer to be completed. On January 27, Brâncuși left again on the same ship he had come with and was in Suez on February 3, to travel to Cairo from there to visit the city's museums and the Sphinx and the pyramids of Giza .
On April 19, 1939, Brâncuși traveled to New York. The occasion was the Art In Our Time exhibition , with which the Museum of Modern Art celebrated its tenth birthday. At the world exhibition taking place in New York during the same period, some of the sculptor's works were also to be shown. However, since the organizers wanted a more suitable location for his work than the Romanian pavilion, they turned to the museum's director, Alfred Barr . He suggested starting the presentation of the exhibition in the museum in the last days of the world exhibition in October. It was agreed to present the sculpture Le Miracle (Le Phoque) (The Miracle [The Seal]) from 1936 in the exhibition, whose two stone bases include a motor with a transformer and a ball bearing, which makes the work turn slowly. At the end of the year, Yvonne Zervos, Christian Zervos ' wife , organized an exhibition at Galerie Mai with works by Brâncuși as well as by Hans Arp , Jorge González Camarena , Paul Klee and Henri Laurens .
Second World War
Brâncuși survived the Second World War in often damp studios - in July 1941 he had rented a medium-sized fifth studio. He lived on sour milk , homemade quark and cabbage, as well as polenta . He built with the help of a large tin can, which he welded a curved and provided with a valve tube, a small still . The allotted tobacco rations were not enough for him because his consumption was considerable. So he got tobacco plants at the flower market, which he continued to grow from his studio window to ensure the basis for his cigarette consumption.
In 1943, Brâncuși produced La Tortue (The Tortoise) marble and a new version of Le Phoque (The Seal) in blue-gray marble. The turtle was displayed upside down by the Guggenheim Museum in 1955 and upside down by the Philadelphia Museum the following year . Brâncuși, who pointed out this mistake to the museums, remarked after the Guggenheim Museum sent him the exhibition catalog: “Well, now it's flying, my turtle!” The work stands on two round stone plinths, one above the other Help a motor turns slowly. The marble was purchased by the Musée National d'Art Moderne in 1947 .
Guggenheim, Maywald and the Arensberg Collection
In 1947 Natalia Dumitresco and Alexandre Istrati , a painter couple from Romania , came to Paris on a grant from the French government and met Brâncuși immediately after their arrival, who asked them to stay with him. They helped the sculptor in his work until his death in 1957. Brâncuși put them in his will as a universal heir.
In the summer of 1947, two works by Brâncuși made available by Peggy Guggenheim were exhibited at the 24th Venice Biennale : Maïastra from 1912 and L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space) from 1940. For a photo report in the magazine Architecture d 'aujourd'hui (Architecture Today) Brâncuși opened his studio to the photographer Willy Maywald . He was commissioned to report on Brâncuși, Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró , Fernand Léger, Henri Matisse and Henri Laurens for a number dedicated to modern sculpture .
A major concern of Brâncuși in 1950 was the appropriate presentation of the private collection jointly managed by Walter and Louise Arensberg . After failed negotiations with various museums, the collection was officially donated to the Philadelphia Museum of Art on December 27 of that year . Before that, an exhibition took place in October. At that time, the Arensberg collection contained 19 works by the sculptor, ten of which came from the estate of John Quinn. The collection also contained works by Paul Cézanne , Vincent van Gogh , Georges Braque and Marcel Duchamp's Nu descendant un escalier no.2 . The wing of the museum, dedicated to Brâncuși, was a spacious hall; In an adjoining room there was a bust of Mademoiselle Pogány made of veined marble, next to The Bathers by Cézanne and a painting by Van Gogh.
The last few years
The Târgu-Jiu-Ensemble was the highlight of his artistic work. In the remaining 19 years of his life, as his recognition grew worldwide, he created about a dozen works, mostly repeating the themes of his earlier work.
On June 13, 1952, Brâncuși received the French citizenship applied for in the previous year. The two daughters Jules Supervielles , who compiled the documents for the sculptor, and the work of the Musée National d'Art Moderne provided assistance. Brâncuși received the ID card issued by the Police Prefecture on October 9th of that year.
On December 31, 1954 , the Hungarian painter and friend Margit Pogány, who became famous for his sculpture portrait Mademoiselle Pogány, died in Australia . In January 1955, Brâncuși suffered a fracture of the femur when he fell. After lengthy inpatient treatment in the hospital, during which he had to endure 30 interventions, five x-ray examinations and 14 laboratory tests, he was able to leave the hospital on May 3, 1955. In the period that followed, he fell several times due to his insecurity on his feet, for example in April 1956 when he fell down a staircase. Brâncuși was emotionally burdened by this and he claimed: "That has always been my weakness, it has to do with my zodiac sign, I am Pisces." At this time he developed prostate disease and eczema. Since he did not believe in traditional medicine, he did not take his doctor-prescribed medication.
After his 80th birthday, the sculptor wondered what would happen to his works after his death. Brâncuși considered an offer from the Guggenheim Museum to be the most interesting, as he was worried about a possible world catastrophe. It said that a museum should be built in New York "that would contain most of his work and would offer the security of a nuclear bunker." The Musée National d'Art Moderne made Brâncuși the proposal that the donation of his works to France , respectively to the city of Paris. At the end of March 1956 the plan arose to build a studio for his works in Meudon on the property of the Rodin Museum, but this was not realized.
Constantin Brâncuși died on March 16, 1957 after a long illness in Paris and was buried on the Cimetière Montparnasse . According to the sculptor's testamentary dispositions, his sole heirs Natalia Dumitresco and Alexandre Istrati handed over the entire inventory of his studio, with the exception of cash, stocks and shares, to the French state in favor of the Musée National d'Art Moderne. In Romania, cultural activists and members of parliament campaign for the return of the remains of Brâncuși to Romania, for which public rallies are also held.
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Brâncuși's sculptural foundations
The year 1907 was the decisive turning point in Constantin Brâncuşi's sculptural development. While his earlier works were still strongly influenced by Auguste Rodin's naturalism, the sculptor now turned his figurative sculptures on the one hand to the taille directe , i.e. the direct visible processing of the material, and on the other hand to the rigorous simplification of the forms. He was inspired and strengthened by the wood sculptures by Paul Gauguin , which he saw in a retrospective in 1906, and in the autumn of 1907 by the block-like stone sculpture L'accroupi by André Derain in the Daniel Kahnweiler gallery . Between 1913 and 1914 he worked with various materials such as stone, wood and plaster and had his work cast in bronze. Brâncuși's main subject was the human head. Like Pablo Picasso , Brâncuși was influenced by African fetish art, which, in a new kind of spiritualization of the material, paired with the situation of the body in space, became the defining theme for cubist sculpture.
Brâncuși's sculptural approach consisted of reducing the subject to elementary basic forms, which were often polished. The artist emphasized that the polish is only necessary for a tightly closed, mature core shape. The material shine of the polished surface should not be understood as a decoration, but as an opening to the room and as a prerequisite for a transparent interplay, whereby the light has a creative task. The recourse to basic geometric shapes corresponded not only to Brâncuși's archetypal form thinking, but also to his striving for abstraction and "primitivism" in sculptural design.
Constantin Brâncuși
Different base shapes
Musée National d'Art Moderne ,
Atelier Brancusi, Paris
Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )
A special feature of the work of the sculptor Brâncuși is the design of the base with the intention of “combining all forms in one form and bringing them to life”. If the base had previously only been regarded as an incidental support of a sculpture, the artist devoted particular attention to it and gave it a sculptural form. For example, he used different materials for the sculpture and base, chose geometric shapes if the sculpture was laid out in a soft, organic manner, or piled several base elements on top of one another. Without this base design, Alberto Giacometti's unity of sculpture and base would be inconceivable. The floor sculptures that appeared in the 1960s, such as those by Joseph Beuys , Richard Serra and Robert Morris , also followed Brâncuși's suggestion.
Selection of some sculptures
Constantin Brâncuși
Le Baiser, 1907
Stein
Muzeul de Arta, Craiova
Link to the picture
Prométhée, 1911
marble
Philadelphia Museum of Art , Philadelphia
Link to picture
Maïastra, 1911
Polished bronze
Tate Gallery , London
Link to picture
Mademoiselle Pogány I, 1912
Marble
Philadelphia Museum of Art , Philadelphia
Link to picture
Le Nouveau-Né I, 1915
marble
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
Link to picture
Princesse X, 1915/16
Polished bronze
Musée National d'Art Moderne ,
Atelier Brancusi, Paris
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )
With the stone sculpture Le Baiser (The Kiss) from 1907, a quote from Rodin's sculpture of the same name from 1886, the sculptor made a theme his own for the first time, which he in the course of his artistic life in different versions, as a sculpture as a drawing, always taken up anew. Inspired by sculptures of Romanian folk art, it may also be reminiscent of the Byzantine imperial figures that are on the north side of St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice , as they have a similar expression. In the emphasis on the hands and the wrapping arms of the block-like motif, the sculpture shows a connection to André Derain's squatting figures, both in size, material, cutting technique and solidity. Derain's work was shown in the Daniel Kahnweiler gallery in the fall of 1907 , shortly before Brâncuși carved the first sculpture of the kiss in stone.
After the kiss , his sculptures became increasingly abstract. In 1911, Brâncuși turned to the theme of Prometheus , which found its form in the sculpture of the same name - once in marble and three times in bronze. The Hungarian painter Margit Pogány translated passages from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Pandora for the sculptor , which deal with the uprising of the titans . He did not deal with the topic in an academic way : "I could not represent this great myth with an eagle eating the liver of a body chained to the Caucasus peak."
From 1911 the sculptor created the Maïastra - with versions in marble and in bronze, followed by an execution in polished bronze in 1912 - a golden miracle bird that appears in Romanian legends and folk tales as Pasărea Măiastră. He is said to have uttered a wonderful song of supernatural power that helped Prince Charming to set his beloved free and who was "involved in the creation of the world and in the struggle between good and evil."
Brâncuși created five versions of Mademoiselle Pogány within two decades : the plaster from 1912 and the following versions in marble and bronze, which were made in 1913, 1919, 1931 and 1933. Mademoiselle Pogany I from 1913 exists in four bronze versions, in which the hair section is patinated , and the plaster of paris . Mademoiselle Pogany II from 1919 is made of veined marble, which is attached to a stone base on three wooden bases and is owned by the New York entrepreneur Ronald S. Lauder . Mademoiselle Pogany III from 1931 is made of white marble on a stone pedestal; Mademoiselle Pogany III from 1933 is a polished bronze with a stone base on a wooden base. Mademoiselle Pogany I and III (1912 and 1931) are in the holdings of the Philadelphia Museum of Art .
In 1915, Brâncuși produced one of his most important works, Le Nouveau-Né I (The Newborn I) . The oval sculpture made of marble shows the head of a newborn baby with its mouth wide open and gasping for air. The sculptor himself put it as follows: “The lungs are filled with air, the existence of a new being on this earth becomes recognizable, with all its life force and its fear of the mysteries.” And further: “The newborns are upset at their birth because they are born against their will. "
The Princesse X sculpture dates from 1916 . There are suspicions that Princess Marie Bonaparte , psychoanalyst and friend of Sigmund Freud , could have inspired Brâncuși to create the sculpture. Princesse X, with her round breasts and long hair, gives the impression of a male genitals, a phallus , which led to an exhibition scandal in Paris in 1920. The British sculptor and writer Nina Hamnett in her 1932 book, describes Laughing Torso bronze as an evolution which arose in 1909, sculpture - the missing marble portrait (Femme se regardant dans un miroir) or Madame P. D. K . Brâncuși himself mentioned a Romanian princess who actually existed at the time for the bronze from 1916, but which he kept secret.
Also in 1916 was the study Portrait de Mme Meyer (Portrait of Mrs. Meyer) executed in wood , which was published in 1930 in a slightly different shape in black marble under the title Portrait de Mme E. Meyer Jr. (Portrait of Mrs. E. Meyer Jr .) was executed. Agnes E. Meyer , whom the sculptor had met through Edward Steichen in 1912 , acquired it in 1934 for $ 3,500 . The wooden sculpture was created during a period when Brâncuși was influenced by African art. “It was also a phase in which he dealt with the problem of balance; designing the head was challenging because of the tip-over and created a profile that is all the more surprising when you consider the perfect straight back. With the exception of one variation, the work is symmetrical down to the lowest element; it strives up nobly from its base and manages to create the impression of a whole figure, although only the head and the neck are shown. "
Constantin Brâncuși
L'Oiseau d'or, 1919
Polished bronze
Art Institute of Chicago , Chicago
Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )
L'Oiseau dans l'espace, 1923
white marble
Center Pompidou, Paris
Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )
In 1919 the sculpture L'Oiseau d'or (The Golden Bird) was created , another milestone in Brâncuși's artistic development; he stretched the oval and feminine form of the marble Maïastra from 1911, of which there is a polished bronze version from 1912, upwards. The resulting simplification of the overall shape emphasizes the swing. “This simplification”, wrote the sculptor, “is not the aim of art. You can reach it against your will if you want to make the true and not the shell that we see, but what it hides. "
With L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space) from 1923, 17 other works of the same title were created from this point in time. 1925 one yellow marble, one white marble and two polished bronzes; 1927 a polished bronze; 1927/28 a polished bronze; A polished bronze in 1928 and a white marble in 1929; 1930 a polished bronze; 1931 a polished bronze, a white marble, a black marble and a blue-gray marble; around 1940 a polished bronze; around 1940 to 1941 a polished bronze and a blue-gray colored plaster, which was created between 1940 and 1945, as well as a last blue-gray marble from 1947. Brâncuși did not focus on the physical attributes of the bird, but on its movement. The wings and feathers have been removed, the body lengthened, the head and beak reduced to an oblique oval surface. He balances on a slender, conical foot, the upward movement is flowing.
The Târgu Jiu Ensemble
Between June and September 1937 the sculptor worked on a war memorial in Târgu Jiu , a work commissioned by the Gorj Women's League ; On July 25, he selected the location for the first sculpture of the three-part monument completed in 1938. The parts of the work La Colonne sans fin (The Endless Column) , La Table du silence (The Table of Silence) and La Porte du baiser ( The Gate of the Kiss ) form an axis over a distance of about one and a half kilometers. There is no clear interpretation for the ensemble; With its sacred character, however, it refers to early ritual stone setting and paved the way for new open forms of the monument in the 20th century.
The endless column
The sculpture was built in the place where the "Romanian troops [...] repulsed the German offensive on the Jiu River in 1916 [...]." Brâncuși had been working with the motif of the Endless Column since 1917. This year it was part of the L'Enfant au monde sculpture group .
The assembly of the cast iron column with its 15 rhombic elements as well as a half element and a three-quarter element was completed in November 1937 and erected in the same month; it rises 29.33 meters and has a total weight of 29 tons. The total weight of the elements is 14226 kilograms; the steel core weighs 15 tons. There are four lightning rods inside the column . On the upper half-element of the column is an impermeable plate that prevents the ingress of water. In July 1938, the cladding was carried out by a Swiss company with gold-plated brass.
In the 1950s, the Endless Pillar , which the communist government disliked as "too bourgeois," was about to be torn down, but the plan was not carried out. In May 1996 the international World Monuments Fund (WMF) included the three-part ensemble of Târgu Jiu in the list of the world's 100 most endangered monuments, whereupon, in addition to the WMF, the World Bank , UNESCO , the Henry Moore Foundation and numerous private donors Romania carried out a restoration which was completed in 2000. Today the Endless Column is the main element of the city arms of Târgu Jiu.
The table of silence
The Table of Silence, surrounded by twelve round stone stools, can be found near the Jiu River . In 1937, Brâncuși set up the first table. Upon his return to Paris, the city fathers decided to have an explanatory inscription carved with the name of the sculptor, which angered Brâncuși after his return to Targu-Jiu in 1938 and demanded that the inscription be removed.
But he didn't like the table anymore, he had a new, larger table made and placed it on the smaller table. Brâncuși initially designed the arrangement of the twelve stone seats, arranged symmetrically around the table, in pairs at a distance of 40 centimeters from the table, but later accepted the current individual arrangement. The dimensions of the upper table diameter are 2.15 m, the thickness 0.43 m, the lower diameter 2 m and 0.45 m thick.
The gate of the kiss
The Table of Silence after about 130 meters followed by the Gate of the Kiss , which, like the table of pale travertine is made. Work on the gate began in June 1937 and ended on September 20, 1938. Brâncuși had two employees for the creation: Ion Alexandrescu from Bucharest and Golea from Dobrita. The gate was inaugurated on October 27, 1938 in Târgu Jiu.
The proportions of the gate were designed according to the dimensions of the golden section . The gate is 5.13 m high and 6.54 m long; the posts are 3.32 m high and 1.69 m wide. The kiss motif is repeated sixteen times on each surface and four times on each side of the travertine frieze. The panels of the frieze are attached to a frame made of iron in the cement. There is a stone bench made of granite on each of the two narrow sides of the gate.
Furniture and objects
Throughout his life, Brâncuși built various furniture, household appliances, tools and everyday objects. According to the sculptor's wishes, they should form a unit together with the sculptures between the sculptural art and his area of life. In 1923, for example, he made a distaff , which he made after returning from a trip to Romania with Eileen Lane. In 1925 he made several plumb bobs and in 1928 a self-made oven - with an oven grate, igniter , and fire hook - that stood in his darkroom . Between 1928 and 1930 he made a lamp made of copper, a simple light bulb in a socket that stands vertically on a cross-shaped stone base, and in 1940 a kettle for roasting coffee. Eight years later, the convinced cook created a stove that he called the "pipe" and that served as an extension of the fireplace.
Photographic work
Brâncuși, who had started taking photos of his works for the first time in 1905, was visibly disappointed in 1914 by a photograph he had seen of one of his marble sculptures at Alfred Stieglitz's gallery in his New York exhibition . The photography is beautiful, but it does not represent his work. He soon recognized "the possibility of the camera as a tool for his work as a sculptor". His photos of the larger and smaller sculptures always show the surrounding space, the studio as a whole, in the manner of a “super work of art”. In 1921 Brâncuși met Man Ray , who confirmed the usefulness of this medium and taught him how to deal with large negatives. They bought a tripod , glass plates and a wooden camera, which Brâncuși used to take his photographs from then on. Since the sculptor wanted to develop the prints himself, a short time later he set up a darkroom in a corner of his studio.
When Brâncuși died at the age of 81, in addition to a work of 215 sculptures, he also left 557 negatives on glass plates - 122 studio photos, 253 factory photos, 183 documentary photos - of which he had made two or three prints . The total of 1299 photographs include 251 studio photos, 697 factory photos and 351 documentary photos.
reception
The Brâncușis studio
“When I first visited the sculptor Brâncuși, I was more impressed by his studio than any cathedral had ever done. [...] Everything looked as if it had grown by itself and was perfect on its own. "
Brâncuși often refused to exhibit and saw his studio on Montparnasse in Impasse Ronsin as the real place where his works were displayed. There he staged them with colored curtains and lighting systems. Brâncuși presented his artistic design from the raw block to the finished objects and their variants, including the works sold, which he exhibited as plaster frames, to the furniture he had made himself: He created art as long shots like the pioneer of modernism, van Gogh , Paul Gauguin and Edvard Munch . The art historian Uwe M. Schneede describes Brâncuși's media possibilities, which he consistently used: the base as part of the sculpture, the studio as a total work of art, his photography as an interpretation and visual memory. Like Kurt Schwitters in his Merzbau , he was artist and curator, exhibition architect, photographer and interpreter at the same time.
After Constantin Brâncuşi's death in 1957, the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris received the contents of his studio from his estate, which contained his sculpting tools and many of his most important sculptures. In accordance with his last will, the studio was reconstructed in its entirety in 1997 by the architect Renzo Piano and made available to the public. The replica of the studio is next to the Center Georges Pompidou at 19 Rue Beaubourg, Place Georges Pompidou.
Brâncuși's influence on Modigliani
In 1909, the Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani met Constantin Brâncuși in Paris and, on his advice, moved into his studio in the Cité Falguière on Montparnasse. They became friends, and through Brâncuși's influence, Modigliani began carving in stone that year, which he brought to the fore until around 1914, as he was impressed by Brâncuși's concise style and by the African sculptures he had got to know through him was. The knowledge of African sculptures also inspired Modigliani in his paintings for his oval portrait faces and elongated body shapes. In his eagerness to work as a sculptor, Modigliani had tried several times to carve out the marble in one piece. Brâncuși found the painter, whose health was suffering severely from the consumption of absinthe and hashish and was therefore unable to cope with these physical tasks, one day lying unconscious next to a stone block that he had worked on until he was completely exhausted. Another time he had picked it up in front of his studio door, dragged him to his bed and waited until Modigliani - who had visited a group of studios where opium was smoked in the back of the courtyard at Impasse Ronsin 11 - was conscious.
Peggy Guggenheim's memories of Brâncuși
The sculptor was friends with some of the wealthy women of society, for example the Baroness Renée Irana Frachon, Agnes E. Meyer and Nancy Cunard , of whom he created sculptural portraits, and Peggy Guggenheim . Guggenheim recalled it in her 1960 autobiography Out of this Century. Confessions of an Art Addict to their relationship: “Brancusi was a wonderful little man with a beard and piercing dark eyes. Half he was a shrewd farm worker, the other half a real god. I was very happy when I was with him. It was a privilege to know him; unfortunately he was very possessive and wanted to consume all of my time. He called me Pegitza […] He used to take beautiful young girls with him on his travels. Now he wanted to take me with him, but I wouldn't let him. He had been to his native Romania, where the government had offered him a contract for public monuments. He was very proud of that. Most of his life he was very frugal and completely devoted to his work. He gave up everything, even relationships with women. So in old age he felt very alone. Brancusi liked to dress well and take me out to dinner when he wasn't cooking for me. He was paranoid and always thought people were spying on him. He loved me very much [...] "
Brâncuși's influence on sculpture
Brâncuși's modular sculpture of the Endless Column made of identical rhomboids offered new possibilities in sculptural art that had not existed before. They were later picked up by the American minimalists . Artists who followed in his footsteps include: Isamu Noguchi , Donald Judd , Carl Andre , William Tucker , Christopher Willmarth and Scott Burton, who designed furniture as sculptures and said that Brâncuși's plinths were works of art as well as his woodwork.
In Colossal Clothspin ( Colossal Clothespin ) from 1972 , for example, Claes Oldenburg , whose sculptures are inspired in a diverse and complex way for form and content by Brâncuși's sculptures, referred to the formal proximity to the sculpture The Kiss , which depicts two people . According to Pop Art , they turn into an artificial object, in this case a clothespin. Dan Flavin dedicated his neon sculpture Diagonale of May 25, 1963 , a neon tube, the basic idea of which corresponds to the polished bronzes of Brâncuși, to the sculptor . With this dedication, Flavin wanted to include his minimalist sculpture "in the great history of sculpture [...] and in one way or another to avoid his work being seen as a completely ordinary light tube."
According to her own statement, the British sculptor Barbara Hepworth was impressed by the artist and his work after visiting Brâncuși's studio in 1932. His treatment of the raw stone henceforth inspired her own work.
Brâncuși's importance for sculptural architecture
Constantin Brâncuși's turn to sculptural architecture is fundamental to the history of modern architecture. On his first visit to Manhattan in 1926, when he saw the skyline , he is said to have exclaimed in surprise: "This is my studio!" The skyscrapers of the present are actually getting closer and closer to the sculptural appearance. “Victory over the standard” is an invention of the twenties and thirties of the last century; In the age of the computer, which no longer knows any dimensions, it is not always without problems. In the exhibition “ArchiSkulptur” 2004/2005 in Basel, the physical model of the skyscraper “ Swiss Re ” by Norman Foster, which was inaugurated in London, was related to the marble sculpture L'Oiseau (1923/47) by Brâncuși. In 1989, Jean Nouvel designed a 425 meter high office building for La Défense in Paris called “Tour sans fins” (“Tower without ends”), the appearance of which became more delicate with increasing height. However, the design was later not implemented.
György Ligeti's Etude after the Colonne sans fin
The Romanian-born composer György Ligeti composed an étude for piano solo No. 14 around 1993 , which he named Brâncușis Coloana fără sfârșit after the Endless Column and which, according to the proportions of 16 modules and one half module - correctly there are 15 modules, one half module and a three-quarter module - was composed, with the scale ascending in an "infinite" spiral.
Brâncuși on the art market
In May 2005, at an auction by Christie’s, a version of Brâncuși's work L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space) , made of gray-blue marble, set the record for the highest price of a sculpture: the hammer fell at 27, US $ 5 million. This version was previously unknown to art scholars. An expert from Christie's discovered it in an attic in France.
The record was exceeded in February 2009: Also at Christie's, at the art auction of the late Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Bergé , the wooden sculpture Portrait de Madame L. R. (Portrait of Madame L. R.) from 1914–1917 achieved a price of over $ 29 million.
In 2012, a highly polished bronze by Le premier cri (The First Cry) from 1917 at Christie's in New York reached a hammer price of $ 13.2 million. It was in the collection of Brâncuși's friend Henri-Pierre Roché for decades . In May 2017, a bronze sculpture measuring just 27 cm ( Sleeping Muse ) again fetched $ 51 million at Christie's (estimate 25 to 35 million).
Honors
In the post-communist era in Brâncuși's native Romania from 1989 onwards, he was posthumously accepted as a member of the Romanian Academy in 1990. In 1991 and 1992, the Romanian National Bank issued banknotes with a portrait of Brâncuși on the obverse, worth 500 lei .
Also in 1992, the University of Constantin Brâncuși (Universitatea Constantin Brâncuși) was opened in Târgu Jiu. The university named after Brâncuși has five faculties and three additional departments.
His place of birth Hobița dedicated the "Casa memorială Constantin Brâncuși" to him.
The German sculptor Erwin Wortelkamp created a wooden sculpture in 1991 with the title Honor for Brâncuși . Brâncuși has also been honored musically: the composer Gerhard Rosenfeld dedicated a sonata for violin and piano to him in 1995 with the title Pour Brâncuși .
Exhibitions (selection)
Solo exhibitions
- 1914: Gallery 291 , New York
- 1926: Wildenstein Gallery , New York
- 1926: Brummer Gallery , New York
- 1955–1956: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum , New York
- 1969: Brancusi retrospective. Philadelphia Museum of Art, catalog by Sidney Geist
- 1996: Brancusi: Selected Masterworks from the Musée National d'Art Moderne and Museum of Modern Art , Museum of Modern Art, New York
- 1999: Constantin Brancusi. The National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest
- 2003: La dation Brancusi. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 2003: Constantine Brancusi Photographs. Albion, London
- 2004: Constantin Brancusi - The Essence of Things. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
- 2004: Constantin Brancusi - The essence of things. Tate Britain, London
- 2005: Brancusi - L'opera al bianco. Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice
- 2005: Histoire de l'Atelier Brancusi. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 2009: Constantin Brâncuși - Art Photographer. National Museum Warsaw
- 2009/10: Constantin Brâncusi. The sculptor as a photographer. Museum of World Cultures , Frankfurt am Main
- 2011: Brancusi, film, photography, images sans fin. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 2018/19: Constantin Brancusi Sculpture. Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, July 22, 2018 to February 17, 2019
- 2019/20: Brancusi. Palais des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles (BOZAR), Brussels, October 2, 2019 to January 12, 2020
Group exhibitions
- 1907: Salon d'Automne , Paris
- 1913: Armory Show , New York
- 1913: Salon des Indépendants , Paris
- 1920: Salon des Indépendants, Paris
- 1926: Trinational Art. Wildenstein Gallery, New York (February)
- 1929: Deuxième exposition de sculpture international. Bernheim-Jeune Gallery , Paris
- 1936: Cubism and Abstract Art. Museum of Modern Art, New York
- 1940: Modern Masters from European and Amerivan Collectors. Museum of Modern Art, New York
- 1942: Art of This Century , New York
- 1943: Mirror of our Time, The Gallatin Collection. Philadelphia Museum of Art , Philadelphia (May)
- 1944: History of an American ' 291 ' and After. Selections from the Stieglitz Collection , Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
- 1949: Galerie Maeght, Paris
- 1954: founder of modern plastic. Kunsthaus Zurich , Zurich
- 1955–1956: The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum , New York
- 1959: documenta II , Kassel
- 1964: documenta III , Kassel
- 1986: SculptureSein. Kunsthalle Düsseldorf , Düsseldorf
- 1995: La Biennale di Venezia. Venice
- 1997: Encounters With Modern Art: Works from the Rothschild Family Collections. San Francisco Museum of Modern Art , San Francisco
- 2008: A Forest of Sculptures. The Simon Spierer Collection. National Museum of Contemporary Art (MNAC), Bucharest
- 2008: 1914 - La Vanguardia y la Gran Guerra. Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum , Madrid
- 2008: Modigliani y su tiempo. Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
- 2009: Leaving Rodin behind? Sculpture in Paris, 1905–1914. Musée d'Orsay , Paris
- 2009/10: From Rodin to Giacometti - Modern Sculpture. State Art Gallery Karlsruhe
- 2011: Constantin Brancusi and Richard Serra , Fondation Beyeler , Basel, May 22 to August 11, 2011
- 2014: Brancusi, Rosso, Man Ray - Framing Sculpture , Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen , Rotterdam, February 8th to May 11th
Works (selection)
- 1898: Vitellius. Plaster of paris, 61 × 43 × 27 cm, Muzeul de Arta, Craiova
- 1900: Laocoon (Laocoon). Plaster of paris , first execution in clay, (lost)
- 1903: Général Dr. Carol Davila (General Dr. Carol Davila). Plaster of paris, 71 × 61 × 33 cm, Institut Sanitar Militar, Bucharest
- 1905: L'Orgeuil (The Pride). Plaster of paris, around 31 × 20 × 22 cm, Muzeul de Arta, Craiova
- 1906: L'Enfant (The Child). Plaster of paris, around 35 × 25.7 × 22.5 cm Collection George Oprescu, Bucharest
- 1907: Le Baiser (The Kiss). Stone , 32.5 × 24.5 × 20 cm, Muzeul de Arta, Craiova
- 1908: Tête d'enfant (child's head). Marble , 17.1 × 30.5 cm, Yolanda Penteado Collection, São Paulo
- 1909: Le Baiser (The Kiss). Stone, 89 × 30 × 20 cm; Stone plinth, 155 × 64 × 33 cm, Montparnasse cemetery , Tanioucha Rashewskaia tomb
- 1909: La Muse endormie I (The slumbering Muse I). Marble, 17.2 × 27.6 × 21.2 cm, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden , Washington, DC
- 1910: La Baronne R. F. (The Baroness R. F.). Stone, 27 cm, location unknown
- 1910: La Muse endormie I (The slumbering Muse I). Bronze, 17.5 × 26.5 × 19 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne , Paris
- 1911: Maïastra. Polished bronze, 90.5 × 17.1 × 17.8 cm, Tate Gallery , London
- 1911: Prométhée (Prometheus). Marble, 12.7 × 7.7 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art , The Louis and Walter Arensberg Collection, Philadelphia
- 1912: Mademoiselle Pogány I. Marble, 61 × 43 × 27 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
- 1913: Mademoiselle Pogány I. Bronze , 43.8 × 27 × 30 cm, Museum of Modern Art , New York
- 1914: Deux pingouins (Two penguins). Marble, 54 × 28.3 × 30.8 cm, Art Institute of Chicago , Chicago
- 1914–1917: Portrait de Madame L. R. (Portrait of Madame L. R.). Oak wood, height 117.1 cm, private property
- 1916: Portrait de Mme Meyer (Portrait Mrs. Meyer). Wood, 83 × 18 × 24 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 1916: Princesse X (Princess X). Marble, 55.8 × 28 × 22.8 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 1916: Sculpture pour aveugles (sculpture for the blind). Marble, 15.2 × 30.4 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
- 1917: La Muse endormie II (The slumbering Muse II). Alabaster , 16.5 × 29.9 × 21 cm, Washington Gallery of Modern Art, Washington, DC
- 1917: Le Premier cri (The First Cry). Polished bronze, 17 × 25.8 × 18 cm, Louisiana Museum , Humlebæk
- 1919: L'Oiseau d'or (The Golden Bird). Polished bronze, 217.8 × 29.9 × 29.9 cm 53.5 cm, Art Institute of Chicago , Chicago
- 1920: La Colonne sans fin (The Endless Column). Wood (old oak), 558 × 34 × 37 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Atelier Brancusi, Paris
- 1919: Mademoiselle Pogány II. Veined marble, 44.2 × 20 × 27 cm, private collection, Chicago
- 1917: La Muse endormie II (The slumbering Muse II). Bronze, 17 × 28.6 × 17 cm, private collection
- 1922: Socrate (Socrates). Wood, 111 × 28.8 × 36.8 cm, Museum of Modern Art, New York
- 1923: L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space). White marble, 144.1 × 16.5 cm, Museum of Modern Art, New York (first work in a series)
- 1923: Tête, Eileen (head, Eileen). Onyx , 29 × 24 × 16 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 1925: L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space). Polished bronze, 127 × 15.5 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
- 1927: Jeune Fille sophistiquée [Portrait de Nancy Cunard] (Adorable girl [Portrait Nancy Cunard]). Wood, 55 × 12.5 × 55 cm, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art , Kansas City
- 1927: L'Oiseau dans l'espace (The Bird in Space). Polished bronze, 184.8 × 16.5 × 12 cm, in: A forest of sculptures - Simon Spierer Collection , Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt
- 1930: Portrait de Mme E. Meyer Jr. (Portrait of Mrs. E. Meyer Jr.). 133 cm, black marble, National Gallery of Art , Washington, DC
- 1931: Mademoiselle Pogány III. white marble, 18 inch, Philadelphia Museum of Art
- 1933: Mademoiselle Pogány III. polished bronze, 44.5 × 17.8 × 24.1 cm, private collection
- 1937–1938: La Colonne sans fin (The Endless Column). 29.33 m, Târgu Jiu
- 1937–1938: La Porte du baiser (The Gate of the Kiss). 513 × 654 × 196 cm, Târgu Jiu
- 1937–1938: La Table du silence (The table of silence). 45 cm, ø 215 cm, Târgu Jiu
- 1943: Le Phoque (The Seal). Gray veined marble, 112 × 100 × 84 cm, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris
- 1943: La Tortue (The Tortoise). White marble, 31.8 × 93 × 69 cm, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum , Paris
literature
- Friedrich Teja Bach : Constantin Brancusi. Metamorphoses of plastic form . DuMont, Cologne 2004, ISBN 3-8321-1839-X .
- Quentin Bajac, Clément Chéroux, Philippe-Alain Michaud: Brancusi, film, photographie, images sans fin . Le Point du Jour, Paris 2011, ISBN 978-2-912132-68-0 .
- Pierre Cabanne: Constantin Brancusi . Pierre Terrail, Paris 2006, ISBN 2-87939-314-0 .
- Sidney Geist : Brancusi. The sculpture and drawings . Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York 1975, ISBN 0-8109-0124-2 .
- Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum , New York, Philadelphia Museum of Art , The Art Institute of Chicago , 1969.
- Carola Giedion-Welcker : Constantin Brancusi . Benno Schwabe & Co, Basel 1958.
- Pontus Hulten (foreword): Brancusi. photograph . Musée National d'Art Moderne, Center National d'Art et de Culture, Georges Pompidou, Paris 1982, ISBN 2-85850-025-8 .
- Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati: Brancusi. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-608-76226-4 .
- Ionel Jianou: Brancusi. Préface de Jean Cassou . Arted, Paris 1982, ISBN 2-85067-062-6 .
- Ina Klein: Constantin Brancusi. Nature, structure, sculpture, architecture . Dissertation, König, Cologne 1991, ISBN 3-88375-182-0 .
Web links
- Brâncuși in the Deutsche Fotothek
- Literature by and about Constantin Brâncuși in the catalog of the German National Library
- Brâncuși at Art Aspects
- Brâncuși at artcyclopedia (English)
- Brâncuși Sculptures Museum of Modern Art, New York
- Faithful replica of his studio ( Memento from August 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), Center Georges Pompidou, Paris (French)
- Materials by and about Constantin Brâncuși in the documenta archive
Notes and individual references
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati: Brancusi. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1986, p. 73.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 57.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 57 ff.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 65.
- ↑ Constantin Brancusi. centrepompidou.fr, accessed on November 28, 2015 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 68.
- ↑ a b c d Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Art Institute of Chicago , 1969, p. 144.
- ↑ Sidney Geist: Brancusi. The sculpture and drawings . Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York 1975, p. 27.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 78.
- ↑ Brancusi's Women ( Memento from January 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Apollo, March 2007 (English)
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 81.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 92.
- ↑ Uwe M. Schneede : The history of art in the 20th century , p. 52.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 98.
- ^ Promenade dans le Paris d'Apollinaire , accessed December 30, 2009 (French).
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, pp. 86 ff.
- ^ Ann Temkin: Constantin Brancusi, 1914, Startling Lucidity. In: Modern art and America , New York / Washington, DC 2001, ISBN 0-8212-2728-9 , pp. 162-163.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 100 ff., P. 112.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 130.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 136.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 148.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 141.
- ↑ Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. P. 139.
- ↑ Brancusi's Women ( Memento from January 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Apollo, March 2007 (English)
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 96, p. 157.
- ↑ Calvin Tomkins: Marcel Duchamp. A biography . Hanser, Munich 1999, p. 280.
- ↑ Olav Velthuis: Duchamp's Financial Documents. toutfait.com, Vol. 1, May 2000, accessed January 28, 2010 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 166.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 171.
- ↑ Thomas Krens (preface): Rendezvous. Masterpieces from the Center Georges Pompidou and the Guggenheim Museums . Guggenheim Museum Publications, New York 1998, ISBN 0-89207-213-X , p. 604.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 110, p. 174.
- ↑ Ionel Jianou, pp. 53-54.
- ↑ Constantin Brancusi / Biography. The Noguchi Museum, accessed August 29, 2012 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 38.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 110, p. 183.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 110, p. 190.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 184, p. 195.
- ↑ Brancusi's Women ( Memento from January 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Apollo, March 2007 (English)
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 217.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 222.
- ↑ Constantin Brancusi. britannica.com, accessed November 27, 2009 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 230.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 232 f.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 234 f.
- ↑ As the marble is flattened at the bottom, it appears as if the sculpture, upside down, is a bird and the shell of the turtle has its wings; Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 315.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 236.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 240.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 249.
- ↑ a b Constantin Brancusi. brain-juice.com, archived from the original on April 15, 2013 ; Retrieved October 13, 2009 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 249 ff.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, pp. 255 f., P. 261.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 265 f.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 261.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 262.
- ↑ Des Roumains réclament le retour de Brancusi au pays. In: France Info / Agence France-Presse . December 6, 2016, accessed October 25, 2019 (French).
- ↑ 31 députés demandent le rapatriement des restes de Constantin Brancusi. In: Le petit journal de Bucarest. November 14, 2012, accessed October 25, 2019 (French).
- ↑ Jochen Schmidt : Instructions for use for Romania . No. 7627 . Piper Verlag, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-492-27627-6 , pp. 191 .
- ^ Theodora Vischer (cat.): Sculpture in the 20th century . Merian-Park Basel, June 3 to September 30, 1984, Basel 1984, p. 39 f.
- ↑ Karin Thomas: Until today. Style history of the fine arts in the 20th century. DuMont, Cologne 2004, ISBN 3-8321-1939-6 . Cubist sculpture : p. 84 f.
- ↑ Constanin Brancusi. La Négresse blonde. Museum of Modern Art, accessed August 29, 2012 .
- ↑ a b c Uwe M. Schneede: The history of art in the 20th century . CH Beck, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-406-48197-3 . P. 140 f.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 281.
- ↑ Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. P. 41.
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 84.
- ↑ Constantin Brancusi 1876–1957. Maiastra , accessed December 28, 2009.
- ^ Mademoiselle Pogány. philamuseum.org, May 28, 1998, archived from the original on March 30, 2011 ; Retrieved October 13, 2009 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 100.
- ↑ Brancusi's Women ( Memento from January 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Apollo, March 2007 (English)
- ^ Brancusi, génie des Carpates. lexpress.fr, April 20, 1995, accessed December 28, 2009 .
- ↑ Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. P. 78.
- ↑ Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. P. 124.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 124.
- ↑ Metropolitan Museum of Art: Bird in Space , accessed July 16, 2013
- ↑ Uwe. M. Schneede: The history of art in the 20th century. P. 140 f.
- ↑ Constanin Brancusi. La column sans fin. universalis.fr, archived from the original on November 27, 2008 ; Retrieved October 18, 2009 .
- ↑ a b Sidney Geist: Constantin Brancusi. 1876-1957. A retrospective exhibition. P. 145.
- ↑ Alexandra Parigoris: Endless Column Restored. sculpture.org, Jan./Febr. 2002, Vol. 21, No. 1, accessed October 17, 2009 .
- ↑ Leo Kroneder: Targu Jiu as a "must visit" for Brâncuși lovers. ots.at, November 20, 2009, accessed on October 13, 2009 .
- ^ A b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 314.
- ↑ Constantin Brancusi. romanianmonasteries.org, accessed November 23, 2009 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 317 f.
- ↑ a b Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 15 f.
- ^ Pontus Hulten (foreword): Brancusi. photograph. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Center National d'Art et de Culture, Georges Pompidou, Paris 1982, p. 10 f.
- ^ Pontus Hulten (foreword): Brancusi. photograph. Paris 1982, p. 10 u. Note 3. p. 12.
- ↑ a b Uwe M. Schneede: The history of art in the 20th century. P. 140.
- ↑ Thomas Krens (preface), p. 206.
- ↑ Painting of the Occident. A collection of pictures from early Christian to contemporary painting , FA Herbig Verlagsbuchhandlung, Berlin-Grunewald 1955, p. 215.
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 129.
- ↑ Brancusi's Women ( Memento from January 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Apollo, March 2007 (English)
- ^ Robert Hughes: Art: Funk And Chic. times.com, December 18, 1995, accessed October 16, 2009 .
- ^ Pontus Hulten, Natalia Dumitresco, Alexandre Istrati, p. 40 f.
- ↑ Barbara Hepworth. christies.com, accessed January 11, 2009 .
- ↑ Catherine Schott: ArchiSkulptur. beyeler.com, accessed October 27, 2009 .
- ↑ Carol Vogel: Art Market Bounces Back in 2nd Night of Spring Sale. nytimes.com, accessed October 23, 2009 .
- ↑ World record for Yves Saint-Laurent. Zeit Online 2009, accessed August 29, 2011 .
- ↑ Lisa Zeitz: Surrealism shows its strength. faz.net, accessed February 4, 2012 .
- ^ STANDARD Verlagsgesellschaft mbH: Brancusi sculpture auctioned for $ 57 million . In: derStandard.at . ( derstandard.at [accessed on May 16, 2017]).
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- ↑ Show Website Brussels 2019/20
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Brâncuși, Constantin |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Brancusi, Constantin |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Romanian-French sculptor and photographer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 19, 1876 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Hobița , Romania |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 16, 1957 |
| Place of death | Paris , France |