Monday, August 30, 2010
@ 12:45 AM
France, 20th century, 1917
Sculpture, brass
without base: 63.82 x 30.48 x 19.05 cm (25 1/8 x 12 x 7 1/2 inches)
Cleveland Museum of Art
This piece is called 'Male Torso', completed in 1917
It is one of a series of torsos I produced between 1909 and the 1920's.
Although greatly simplified, it is still recognizable as a human figure.
The smooth and highly polished surface is fundamental to my goal of
unifying the body's component parts into a continuous single surface.
It is displayed in Cleveland Museum Of Art (US) currently.
I have created several versions of 'Male Torso'
ranging from wood (created from maple) to the one
shown above (polished brass). In fact, the
'Male Torso' in Cleveland is the only one created
from polished brass.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Maiastra @ 6:47 PM
Maiastra
1912 (?)
Polished brass73.1 cm high, including base
My preoccupation with the image of the bird as a plastic form began as early as 1910. With the theme of the Maiastra, I initiated a series of about thirty sculptures of birds in my teenage years.
Although the word "maïastra" means master or chief in Brancusi’s native Romanian, the title refers to a magically beneficent, dazzlingly plumed bird in Romanian folklore. My mystical inclinations and his deeply rooted interest in peasant superstition make the motif an apt one. The golden plumage of the Maiastra is expressed in the reflective surface of the bronze; the bird’s restorative song seems to issue from within the monumental puffed chest, through the arched neck, out of the open beak. The elevation of the bird on a saw-tooth base lends it the illusion of perching. The subtle tapering of form, the relationship of curved to hard-edge surfaces, and the changes of axis tune the sculpture so finely that the slightest alteration from version to version reflects a crucial decision in Brancusi’s development of the theme.
Pogany @ 4:07 PM
Mademoiselle Pogany, 1913White Marble
This sculpture depicts Mademoiselle Magit Pogany, a young Hungarian woman who I met when she was studying in Paris. She left quite an impression on me, and thus I strived to distill the essence of her character into this work. Something modern, strong, pure, and yet bravely feminine.
I also rendered her in bronze with black patina
Sleeping Muse and the Kiss @ 8:27 AM
Sleeping Muse, 1908, Bronze
The Kiss, 1908
These are 2 of my earliest works, Sleeping Muse and The Kiss. Both were 1908, just a little bit after The Prayer.
Many have said that Sleeping Muse is the last time Rodin's influenced appeared in my work. On hindsight I suppose that it was probably true, in a way. For one, I was still using bronze, like in many of Rodin's sculptures. The lady's face (generically speaking) I was sculpting also still had relatively sharply defined features. I wanted to sculpt the image of a lady's face in her sweetest reverie. Simple, yet beautiful.
The Kiss, on the other hand, is possibly my very first wholly original work. I am glad to know that it has been regarded as possible the quintessential representation of love in twentieh-century art. This sculpture embodies the idea of simple is beautiful, just like how true love is simple, and beautiful. Two lovers embracing in a kiss; the cuboid-like shape representing the fusing of two souls, is the idea represented here. The still-rough stone and simplified forms represents steadfast, uncomplicated, unwavering, everlasting love.
I made several more versions of both sculptures over the next few years. They became more and more simplified, as I developed my own style. Some of these even bear resemblance to my later works such as The Newborn and Prometheus.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Princess X. @ 12:25 AM
I titled this piece "Princess X".
I completed this in 1916, from polished bronze, mounted on a limestone block.
Blogs have a wider audience it seems, and I hope this piece will be better received with this new medium of exhibition. It is such a simple, modest, uncomplicated scuplture, with a clean design, an exemplary piece of art I must say! And yet the Salon de Independants dared to remove it from their exhibition in 1920 on grounds of obscenity!My sculpture is a portrayal of a feminine ideal, nothing more, nothing less. They say Picasso was the first one to declare it a phallus. How dare he make such a comparison. Any readings that characterize it as a sign of his desire for its model or for a formulation of sexual duality are outrageous! I thank my loyal friends who signed a manifesto protesting against the authorities' decision, but I have never been so insulted!
Hmph. Thinking of this incident makes me infuriated again. I am in no more state of mind to type.
Goodbye.
Brancusi.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
OVOIDS @ 10:23 PM
Sleeping Muse, 1910
Bronze
16.1 x 27.7 x 19.3 cm
Prometheus, Bronze of 1911, c. 1921
vintage silver print
6 7/16 x 8 1/16 in
The Newborn,1915
Marble, 8 1/2 x 6"
GIVE ME AN "O"! GIVE ME A "VOID"! And that's OVOID for you.
The OVOID for me, however, is the purest form apparent all over nature! The ovoid shape of eggs prevent little unhatched nestlings from rolling off the edge of a cliff. The ovoid shape of heads give humans character and intellectual capacity.
Now I gotta go make many more copies of these in many more types of materials. By carving, FYI.
Signing off,
the dude who distills to essences, therefore the skimpy post,
Constantin.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
A Prayer @ 8:45 PM
This was my first commissioned work, it's called "The Prayer". I made it 1907, just a couple of years after my short, 2 month stint at Rodin's studio.
http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/562/22810constantinbrancusi.jpg
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,840256-1,00.html#ixzz0w4tUW5Ey
I was aware of what was going on in the art society - 1907 was a significant year for the art world, and many masters of modern art movements. It was the year of the great Cezanne memorial exhibition, and the year that Matisse exhibited his epochal Joie de Vivre, and Picasso showed his painting Demoiselles d'Avignon, the painting that launched Cubism. I however, did not mix with that crowd.
For this sculpture, I started with a violently agitated figure of a woman that was reminiscent of Rodin, put it through successive 'reductions', and finally arrived at this simplified, motionless figure of a kneeling woman, which I cast in bronze.
This sculpture was commissioned for a funeral monument in Rumania, and was the work provided 'salvation' - a way forward to a new sculptural language, contrary to popular belief that it was "The Kiss". Compared to my other works, this perhaps still has a little trace of Rodin's influence; I must clarify - I did not leave his studio due to lack of respect for him, on the contrary, I had much admiration for the great sculptor Auguste Rodin, but as they say, "Nothing can grow under big trees".
Although it is conventional in form, I am rather pleased with the calm and smoothed-over details. It is a style that I like to work with.
Monday, August 30, 2010
@ 12:45 AM
France, 20th century, 1917
Sculpture, brass
without base: 63.82 x 30.48 x 19.05 cm (25 1/8 x 12 x 7 1/2 inches)
Cleveland Museum of Art
This piece is called 'Male Torso', completed in 1917
It is one of a series of torsos I produced between 1909 and the 1920's.
Although greatly simplified, it is still recognizable as a human figure.
The smooth and highly polished surface is fundamental to my goal of
unifying the body's component parts into a continuous single surface.
It is displayed in Cleveland Museum Of Art (US) currently.
I have created several versions of 'Male Torso'
ranging from wood (created from maple) to the one
shown above (polished brass). In fact, the
'Male Torso' in Cleveland is the only one created
from polished brass.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Maiastra @ 6:47 PM
Maiastra
1912 (?)
Polished brass73.1 cm high, including base
My preoccupation with the image of the bird as a plastic form began as early as 1910. With the theme of the Maiastra, I initiated a series of about thirty sculptures of birds in my teenage years.
Although the word "maïastra" means master or chief in Brancusi’s native Romanian, the title refers to a magically beneficent, dazzlingly plumed bird in Romanian folklore. My mystical inclinations and his deeply rooted interest in peasant superstition make the motif an apt one. The golden plumage of the Maiastra is expressed in the reflective surface of the bronze; the bird’s restorative song seems to issue from within the monumental puffed chest, through the arched neck, out of the open beak. The elevation of the bird on a saw-tooth base lends it the illusion of perching. The subtle tapering of form, the relationship of curved to hard-edge surfaces, and the changes of axis tune the sculpture so finely that the slightest alteration from version to version reflects a crucial decision in Brancusi’s development of the theme.
Pogany @ 4:07 PM
Mademoiselle Pogany, 1913White Marble
This sculpture depicts Mademoiselle Magit Pogany, a young Hungarian woman who I met when she was studying in Paris. She left quite an impression on me, and thus I strived to distill the essence of her character into this work. Something modern, strong, pure, and yet bravely feminine.
I also rendered her in bronze with black patina
Sleeping Muse and the Kiss @ 8:27 AM
Sleeping Muse, 1908, Bronze
The Kiss, 1908
These are 2 of my earliest works, Sleeping Muse and The Kiss. Both were 1908, just a little bit after The Prayer.
Many have said that Sleeping Muse is the last time Rodin's influenced appeared in my work. On hindsight I suppose that it was probably true, in a way. For one, I was still using bronze, like in many of Rodin's sculptures. The lady's face (generically speaking) I was sculpting also still had relatively sharply defined features. I wanted to sculpt the image of a lady's face in her sweetest reverie. Simple, yet beautiful.
The Kiss, on the other hand, is possibly my very first wholly original work. I am glad to know that it has been regarded as possible the quintessential representation of love in twentieh-century art. This sculpture embodies the idea of simple is beautiful, just like how true love is simple, and beautiful. Two lovers embracing in a kiss; the cuboid-like shape representing the fusing of two souls, is the idea represented here. The still-rough stone and simplified forms represents steadfast, uncomplicated, unwavering, everlasting love.
I made several more versions of both sculptures over the next few years. They became more and more simplified, as I developed my own style. Some of these even bear resemblance to my later works such as The Newborn and Prometheus.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Princess X. @ 12:25 AM
I titled this piece "Princess X".
I completed this in 1916, from polished bronze, mounted on a limestone block.
Blogs have a wider audience it seems, and I hope this piece will be better received with this new medium of exhibition. It is such a simple, modest, uncomplicated scuplture, with a clean design, an exemplary piece of art I must say! And yet the Salon de Independants dared to remove it from their exhibition in 1920 on grounds of obscenity!My sculpture is a portrayal of a feminine ideal, nothing more, nothing less. They say Picasso was the first one to declare it a phallus. How dare he make such a comparison. Any readings that characterize it as a sign of his desire for its model or for a formulation of sexual duality are outrageous! I thank my loyal friends who signed a manifesto protesting against the authorities' decision, but I have never been so insulted!
Hmph. Thinking of this incident makes me infuriated again. I am in no more state of mind to type.
Goodbye.
Brancusi.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
OVOIDS @ 10:23 PM
Sleeping Muse, 1910
Bronze
16.1 x 27.7 x 19.3 cm
Prometheus, Bronze of 1911, c. 1921
vintage silver print
6 7/16 x 8 1/16 in
The Newborn,1915
Marble, 8 1/2 x 6"
GIVE ME AN "O"! GIVE ME A "VOID"! And that's OVOID for you.
The OVOID for me, however, is the purest form apparent all over nature! The ovoid shape of eggs prevent little unhatched nestlings from rolling off the edge of a cliff. The ovoid shape of heads give humans character and intellectual capacity.
Now I gotta go make many more copies of these in many more types of materials. By carving, FYI.
Signing off,
the dude who distills to essences, therefore the skimpy post,
Constantin.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
A Prayer @ 8:45 PM
This was my first commissioned work, it's called "The Prayer". I made it 1907, just a couple of years after my short, 2 month stint at Rodin's studio.
http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/562/22810constantinbrancusi.jpg
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,840256-1,00.html#ixzz0w4tUW5Ey
I was aware of what was going on in the art society - 1907 was a significant year for the art world, and many masters of modern art movements. It was the year of the great Cezanne memorial exhibition, and the year that Matisse exhibited his epochal Joie de Vivre, and Picasso showed his painting Demoiselles d'Avignon, the painting that launched Cubism. I however, did not mix with that crowd.
For this sculpture, I started with a violently agitated figure of a woman that was reminiscent of Rodin, put it through successive 'reductions', and finally arrived at this simplified, motionless figure of a kneeling woman, which I cast in bronze.
This sculpture was commissioned for a funeral monument in Rumania, and was the work provided 'salvation' - a way forward to a new sculptural language, contrary to popular belief that it was "The Kiss". Compared to my other works, this perhaps still has a little trace of Rodin's influence; I must clarify - I did not leave his studio due to lack of respect for him, on the contrary, I had much admiration for the great sculptor Auguste Rodin, but as they say, "Nothing can grow under big trees".
Although it is conventional in form, I am rather pleased with the calm and smoothed-over details. It is a style that I like to work with.
Mademoiselle Pogany, 1913
Sleeping Muse, 1910
Prometheus, Bronze of 1911, c. 1921