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Tall Figure

A work made of bronze.
© 2018 Succession Giacometti / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris

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  • A work made of bronze.

Date:

1947

Artist:

Alberto Giacometti
Swiss, 1901–1966

About this artwork

After first producing work associated with Surrealism, Alberto Giacometti began making his distinctive elongated, skeletal bronze sculptures in Paris in the late 1940s. His works struck a powerful chord with the Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre, who saw the isolated figures as a visualization of his own ideas about the loneliness and ultimate absurdity of the human condition at the end of World War II. For his part, Giacometti insisted that he was simply attempting to convey his own experience of looking at people, though his method of working was sympathetic to Sartre’s response. The artist often reworked his sculptures over long periods of time, building up a clay model and then stripping it down, until he gradually eroded the figure’s body to its essential, fragile core.

Status

On View, Gallery 398

Department

Contemporary Art

Artist

Alberto Giacometti

Title

Tall Figure

Place

Switzerland (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1947

Medium

Bronze

Edition

3 of 6

Dimensions

202 × 22 × 41.6 cm (79 1/2 × 8 5/8 × 16 3/8 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Lannan Foundation

Reference Number

1959.21

Copyright

© 2018 Succession Giacometti / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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