Fondation Giacometti -  Bust
AGD 2180

Bust

Date 1947

Medium Oil on canvas

Dimensions 22,04 x 10,82 in.

Collection Private collection

Description

During his life, Giacometti created heads and busts in drawing, sculpture and painting. More particularly he made several painted busts in the second half of the 1940s.
This painting is one of the rare profile busts painted by Giacometti. It probably is the representation of a sculpture whose subject is rather difficult to identify today.
The very specific hairstyle reminds us of the bust of Simone de Beauvoir for whom Giacometti made a head in plaster in 1946.

The face is without details; black strokes alone sketch the contours and the general physiognomy of the head. The brown background is schematised by straight lines that frame the subject with a “window”, a tool often used by Giacometti. The re-framing of the painting with the black frame around the character enables us to concentrate our gaze on the bust and place it in a well-defined space.
The dark background probably conceals a first bust, visible to the naked eye above the figure.

Signed and dated on the canvas in the bottom right angle (“Alberto Giacometti/47”), the work was never exhibited in the artist's lifetime, nor after his death.

Inscription

Signed and dated with a paintbrush at the bottom right corner "Alberto Giacometti / 47"

Provenance

Pierre MATISSE
Claude BERNARD
Larry ALDRICH
Sale Sotheby's New York New York, NY (United States Of America), October 30th, 1963, lot n ° 55
Private collection
Private collection
Sale Sotheby's New York New York, NY (United States Of America), December 9th, 1965, lot n ° 117
Private collection
Brook Street Gallery
Sale Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc. New York, NY (United States Of America), October 15th, 1969, lot n ° 68
Reiss-Cohen Gallery
Sale Christie's London London (United Kingdom), June 29th, 1981, lot n ° 56
James Goodman Gallery
Sale Sotheby's London London (United Kingdom), December 1st, 1982, lot n ° 59
Sale Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc. New York, NY (United States Of America), May 16th, 1984, lot n ° 414
Private collection
Private collection
Bentley Gallery
Private collection
Sale Sotheby's New York New York, NY (United States Of America), November 7th, 2012, lot n ° 127
Private collection

Bibliography

Impressionist & Modern Art Day Sale, New York, NY : Sotheby's New York, 2012, lot no. 127

To search for a work, consult the Alberto Giacometti Database