Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966)
Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966)

Projet pour un monument

Details
Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966)
Giacometti, A.
Projet pour un monument
painted plaster
Height: 18 in. (46 cm.)
Width: 6 in. (16.5 cm.)
Depth: 11 in. (29.2 cm.)
Executed circa 1946; unique
Provenance
Galerie Krugier, Geneva.
Galerie Motte, Geneva.
Acquired by the present owner, circa 1970.
Literature
R. Hohl, Alberto Giacometti, Stuttgart, 1971, p. 296, no. 75 (illustrated).
Exhibited
Kunsthalle Basel, Giacometti, June-August 1966, no. 68.
Busto Arsizio, Italiana Arte, Alberto Giacometti, 1982, no. 4 (illustrated).
Paris, Fondation Electricit de France/Espare Electra, Monument et Modernit, 1996, p. 63 (illustrated).

Lot Essay

The Association Alberto and Annette Giacometti and Mary Lisa Palmer will include this work in their forthcoming Alberto Giacometti catalogue raisonn.

Project pour un monument is the original plaster version from which Giacometti used to make an edition in bronze a few years later. This work was developed by Giacometti as a project for a post-World War II monument in memory of Gabriel Peri, the French journalist who was killed as a hostage held by the Germans in December 1941. This unrealised project was requested by the American architect Paul Nelson, who was a friend of the sculptor.

The figure of the walking man is an important theme in Giacometti's oeuvre of which examples are first seen in the 1940s. Related sculptures include Homme qui marche sous la pluie, 1947, Trois hommes qui marchent, 1948 and La place, 1947-1948. This theme culminated in one of Giacometti's most celebrated works, the great Homme qui marche II, 1960, designed for the Chase Manhattan Bank Plaza in New York City.

Mary Lisa Palmer, Director of the Association Alberto et Annette Giacometti states that during the casting process small damages occured to the foot, leg and body of the figure. These have since been restored to the high standard and under the supervision of the Association Alberto and Annette Giacometti in Paris.


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