Word: giacomettis
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Giacometti continued to work be cause, said he, "I am curious to know why I fail." None of his human figures, he felt, captured what he saw. None could-for what he saw was the fleeting essence of man. It is no surprise that Jean-Paul Sartre celebrated him as the ideal existentialist artist. Somewhere be hind the plaster contours of his stick figures lay the truth of man's mortality. "I know," said Giacometti, "with absolute, unshakable certainty that I can never succeed in reproducing what I see, even if I live to be a thousand...
...Swiss impressionist painter, Giacometti went to Paris in 1922 to study with Rodin's pupil Bourdelle, and settled in the tiny Montparnasse studio where he worked the rest of his life...
Slave of Perception. Giacometti was never satisfied by the search. He considered none of his sculptures complete, often in a frenzy of frustration ended up smashing them by the dozen. Only about 200 originals exist today. Said the sculptor: "If I work from life, I see a little bit at a time. And it is al ways changing. Try as I may, it never looks the same to me. So how can I finish?" He became the slave of his own changing perceptions. At times, in pursuit of a likeness, he carved the plaster until it disintegrated into dust between...
...great bohemians, Giacometti loved to haunt cafes until late at night. His stingy 12-ft. by 15-ft. studio, lit by a dusty studio window and bare light bulbs, heated by a potbellied stove, was strewn with butts of cigarettes that he chimneyed at the rate of three or four packs a day. Its grimy floor was for Giacometti a battlefield. He once made a model sit in the same pose for years in a vain attempt to capture her likeness. He traveled little except for trips to Stampa, Switzerland, at Christmas and New Year...
...last year, he had retrospectives in Paris, Copenhagen and London. He won first prizes at the Pittsburgh International Exhibition in 1961, the Venice Biennale in 1962, and was awarded the $10,000 Guggenheim International in 1964 and France's coveted Grand Prix National des Arts in 1965. But Giacometti cared more for life than honors. Said he, "I prefer the sight of a bird living in the sky to any masterpiece...