Fondation Giacometti

In 1954, Giacometti delivered several painted and sculpted portraits of his wife, very precisely depicted and unusually realistic, this being one of them. Annette’s delicate anatomy is perfectly readable and her face as well as her hair easily identifiable. Indeed the work was exhibited for the first time in bronze at the Venice Biennale in 1962, with the title “Annette dal vero” (“Annette from life”). The whole figure stands out with the sharpness of a drawing in space. The lines that go over the figure evoke the brush touches of the paintings representing Annette standing naked in the studio in that same year. The piece was cast in bronze by the artist from 1954 onwards, and the edition carried on after his death. In 2009, 10 castings existed, on a possible legal edition of 12.

No inscription

Alberto GIACOMETTI
Succession Alberto Giacometti
Fondation Giacometti

1965 Alberto Giacometti. Sculpture Paintings Drawings 1913 1965, London (United Kingdom), Tate Gallery, from July 17th to August 30th 1965, no. 58
2007 L'atelier d'Alberto Giacometti, Paris (France), Musée national d'art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, from October 15th 2007 to February 11th 2008, no. 197
2019 Histoire de corps, Paris (France), Institut Giacometti, from June 22nd to November 6th 2019
2023 Annette en plus infiniment, Paris (France), Institut Giacometti, from July 11th to September 27th 2023

David SYLVESTER, Alberto Giacometti. Sculpture. Paintings. Drawings 1913 1965, London : Arts Council of Great Britain, 1965, cat. no. 58
Véronique WIESINGER (under the direction of), L'atelier d'Alberto Giacometti, Paris : Fondation Giacometti, 2007 / Paris : Musée national d'art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, 2007, cat. no. 197, ill. p. 404