Casoar (à deux têtes)

During the winter of 1963, Jean Tinguely made a trip to Asia which ended in Japan. This work is from a group he created for his first exhibition there, at Gallery Minami in Tokyo. The exhibition was accompagnied by a comic catalogue in spirit with the artist's work, containing a recording of the 'Tinguely Sound', composed by Toshi Uchiyanagi and which was based on the sound of Tinguely's sculptures. Tinguely's work is mainly concerned with movement and sound, satirising technological advances with his unique brand irony. This work is a fine and rare early example of his sculptures crafted from found materials and incorporating motor elements to ensure continued flux and movement, diametrically opposed to notions of classic, static sculpture. The work is part of his Baluba series, where the structure and weight of the found materials contrasts with the addition of a deliberately delicate and ephemeral element. Here, Tinguely has positioned a feather at the top of the work which dances up and down, lending a lightness an otherwise firm structure (air, like water or sound, being one of the immaterial forms the artist loved to incorporate into his sculptures), making this sculpture full of the rough poetry and irony found in Tinguely's most memorable work.