JACQUES LIPCHITZ (1891-1973)

Details

JACQUES LIPCHITZ (1891-1973)

L'Enlevement d'Europe I

signed, numbered and marked with thumbprint on the base Lipchitz ?/7--bronze with patina
Height: 16½ in. (42 cm.)
Length: 21 in. (53.2 cm.)

Cast in 1938; number in an edition of seven

Literature

A.M. Hammacher, Jacques Lipchitz, His Sculpture, New York, 1960, no. LX (cf. illustration of related version, p. 61)
J. Lipchitz, My Life in Sculpture, New York, 1972, p. 40
A.G. Wilkinson, Jacques Lipchitz, A Life in Sculpture, Toronto, 1989, (Art Gallery of Ontario exhibition catalogue; another cast illustrated, p. 127, no. 81)

Lot Essay

In Greek mythology, the god Jupiter seduced Europa, the daughter of the King of Phoenicia, by transforming himself into a bull and enticing her to mount his back. He then carried her off to Crete. In this sculpture Europa clings to the bull as he swims toward their destination. Lipchitz noted that "the appendages at the back suggest a fishlike form. In my collection there is an extremely rare Coptic piece in which the bull takes on a different aquatic shape. I think I may have been influenced by this." (Jacques Lipchitz, op.cit.,
p. 140)