Fondation Giacometti

When Giacometti was quite young, he was already modelling heads. It was for him the exercise par excellence, enabling him to move forward in his effort to depict the particular vision he had of the world surrounding him. As Giacometti confided to André Parinaud in 1962: “If one had a head, one would have everything else; if one doesn’t have the head, one has nothing.” These busts of men, for which Giacometti’s brother has very likely sat, are not a portrait in the conventional sense of the term, but an effort repeated in a systematic fashion to penetrate the heart of the essence of the human being. With that work in series devoid of any anecdote, Giacometti also showed himself an artist in phase with the interests and researches of artists in the Fifties and Sixties. Diego Giacometti was the favourite male model of his brother, whose assistant and technical expert he had been since the middle of the Twenties. Though initially living in Alberto’s studio, Diego then rented a studio adjoining at 46 rue Hippolyte-Maindron, and because of that, he was always available. Thanks to him, Alberto Giacometti was able to practise without limitation the depiction of a man’s head as he saw it. Alternating the work from life and from memory, Giacometti had such an intimacy with his model that the latter used to appear repeatedly in spite of himself, under his ballpoint pen and between his fingers, sometimes merging with his own features.

Signature and cast number on the back, on the bottom to the right "Alberto Giacometti / 8/8"

Annette GIACOMETTI
Private collection
Private collection
Private collection

2005 Alberto Giacometti au donjon de Vez, Vez (France), Donjon de Vez, from June 18th to October 2nd 2005
2006 Alberto Giacometti, Kamakura (Japan), The Museum of Modern Art, from June 3rd to July 30th 2006, no. II-23
2006 Alberto Giacometti, Kobe (Japan), Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, from August 8th to October 1st 2006, no. II-23
2006 Alberto Giacometti, Sakura (Japan), Kawamura Memorial Museum of Art, from October 10th to December 3rd 2006, no. II-23
2008 Alberto Giacometti, Rotterdam (Netherlands), Kunsthal, from October 18th 2008 to February 8th 2009, no. 98
2010 Daniel Buren & Alberto Giacometti. Oeuvres contemporaines 1964-1966, Paris (France), Galerie Kamel Mennour, from April 29th to July 24th 2010

Véronique WIESINGER (under the direction of), Alberto Giacometti au Donjon de Vez, Oeuvres de la Fondation Alberto et Annette Giacometti, Vez : Donjon de Vez, 2005, p. 47, ill. p. 39, 41 & 47
Véronique WIESINGER, Toshio YAMANASHI (under the direction of), Alberto Giacometti, Tokyo : The Tokyo Shimbun, 2006, cat. no. II-23, p. 51, ill. p. 51
Véronique WIESINGER, Charlotte VAN LINGEN (under the direction of), Alberto Giacometti, Harderwijk : D'jonge Hond, 2008, cat. no. 98, ill. p. 138
Véronique WIESINGER, Daniel BUREN (under the direction of), Daniel Buren & Alberto Giacometti. Oeuvres contemporaines 1964-1966, Paris : Kamel Mennour, 2010, p. 134, ill. p. 135
Véronique WIESINGER, Daniel BUREN (under the direction of), Daniel Buren & Alberto Giacometti. Oeuvres contemporaines 1964-1966, Paris : Kamel Mennour, 2010, p. 134, ill. p. 135