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Lot Essay
Painted in 1949, Alberto Giacometti’s Nature morte dans l’atelier illustrates the fervent energy with which the artist resumed painting after the end of the Second World War. Filled with rapid brushstrokes that interweave and overlap one another to create a rich surface, the composition is a captivating meditation on the act of observation, taking as its subject a simple still life set within the artist’s atelier. Acquired by Max Berry in 1967, the work has been an important centerpiece of his extraordinary collection for over half a century, and is a testament to his deep appreciation and understanding of the breadth and dynamism of Giacometti’s oeuvre.
Nature morte dans l’atelier focuses on a cluttered tabletop situated beneath the large windows of Giacometti’s atmospheric studio at 46 rue Hippolyte-Maindron, in Montparnasse. Affectionately nicknamed “the cave,” the artist had moved to this space in December 1926 and—though it had no running water, a rough concrete floor, and a roof that leaked—it became his primary workspace for the next forty years. According to visitors, the walls were covered in quickly executed sketches of Giacometti’s fleeting ideas, various maquettes and plaster sculptures were haphazardly grouped together on tables, sideboards or on the floor, and a plethora of drawings and paintings were gathered together in loose piles, every item and surface covered with layers of dust, clay, and plaster. “The walls are gray, the sculptures gray and white, interspersed with the sepia accent of wood or the full glint of bronze,” the artist and publisher Alexander Lieberman recalled. “In the darker corners of the room, the long, narrow life-size figures seem like apparitions from another planet” (quoted in The Artist and His Studio, New York, 1960, p. 277).
In Nature morte dans l’atelier, Giacometti trains his eye on a seemingly informal arrangement of miscellaneous objects. A cluster of bottles and small jars occupy the center of the composition, while several sculptures are positioned on either side, their outlines glimpsed through a network of loose brushstrokes. The scene recalls Lieberman’s descriptions of a long table “under a large window… completely covered with squeezed tubes of paint, palettes, brushes, rags and bottles of turpentine. Like figures, the bottles are enveloped in layers of dust torn from Giacometti's studio... Here, sculpture and painting blend intimately” (ibid., pp. 277-278). The presence of the sculptural works within the scene acts as a subtle nod to the development of Giacometti’s style during this period, as he shifted away from his abstract compositions of the early 1930s—represented by Sans titre (circa 1931-1932), visible towards the back of the table—and began to explore a new sense of form in his most recent, post-War works—illustrated by the thin, elongated standing women aligned along the right edge. In this way, Giacometti eloquently captures a sense of the passage of time, drawing attention to the dynamic evolution of his visionary style.
By subjecting these sculptures to the analytical gaze of the painter, Giacometti was in effect remaking them once again, this time through a vastly different material and perspective. Though there is a casualness to the scene, as if it caught the artist’s eye in passing one afternoon and intrigued him, the delicate internal balance within the arrangement of the objects on the canvas reveals the intention and careful consideration that underpinned Giacometti’s approach to structuring his still-life compositions. His real subject, it appears, was the space between these quotidian items, colorless and insubstantial, yet palpable in its tension and energy. This is further enhanced by the artist’s vigorous brushwork, which dances across the canvas, the pigment shifting consistency from passages of thickly impastoed paint, to fluid washes that pool and drip. These vigorous marks convey the scene through a highly nuanced grisaille palette, punctuated by subtle tones of amber, rust red, and ochre, capturing the unique atmosphere of Giacometti’s creative space, and the intriguing forms that surrounded him as he worked.
Nature morte dans l’atelier focuses on a cluttered tabletop situated beneath the large windows of Giacometti’s atmospheric studio at 46 rue Hippolyte-Maindron, in Montparnasse. Affectionately nicknamed “the cave,” the artist had moved to this space in December 1926 and—though it had no running water, a rough concrete floor, and a roof that leaked—it became his primary workspace for the next forty years. According to visitors, the walls were covered in quickly executed sketches of Giacometti’s fleeting ideas, various maquettes and plaster sculptures were haphazardly grouped together on tables, sideboards or on the floor, and a plethora of drawings and paintings were gathered together in loose piles, every item and surface covered with layers of dust, clay, and plaster. “The walls are gray, the sculptures gray and white, interspersed with the sepia accent of wood or the full glint of bronze,” the artist and publisher Alexander Lieberman recalled. “In the darker corners of the room, the long, narrow life-size figures seem like apparitions from another planet” (quoted in The Artist and His Studio, New York, 1960, p. 277).
In Nature morte dans l’atelier, Giacometti trains his eye on a seemingly informal arrangement of miscellaneous objects. A cluster of bottles and small jars occupy the center of the composition, while several sculptures are positioned on either side, their outlines glimpsed through a network of loose brushstrokes. The scene recalls Lieberman’s descriptions of a long table “under a large window… completely covered with squeezed tubes of paint, palettes, brushes, rags and bottles of turpentine. Like figures, the bottles are enveloped in layers of dust torn from Giacometti's studio... Here, sculpture and painting blend intimately” (ibid., pp. 277-278). The presence of the sculptural works within the scene acts as a subtle nod to the development of Giacometti’s style during this period, as he shifted away from his abstract compositions of the early 1930s—represented by Sans titre (circa 1931-1932), visible towards the back of the table—and began to explore a new sense of form in his most recent, post-War works—illustrated by the thin, elongated standing women aligned along the right edge. In this way, Giacometti eloquently captures a sense of the passage of time, drawing attention to the dynamic evolution of his visionary style.
By subjecting these sculptures to the analytical gaze of the painter, Giacometti was in effect remaking them once again, this time through a vastly different material and perspective. Though there is a casualness to the scene, as if it caught the artist’s eye in passing one afternoon and intrigued him, the delicate internal balance within the arrangement of the objects on the canvas reveals the intention and careful consideration that underpinned Giacometti’s approach to structuring his still-life compositions. His real subject, it appears, was the space between these quotidian items, colorless and insubstantial, yet palpable in its tension and energy. This is further enhanced by the artist’s vigorous brushwork, which dances across the canvas, the pigment shifting consistency from passages of thickly impastoed paint, to fluid washes that pool and drip. These vigorous marks convey the scene through a highly nuanced grisaille palette, punctuated by subtle tones of amber, rust red, and ochre, capturing the unique atmosphere of Giacometti’s creative space, and the intriguing forms that surrounded him as he worked.