César Baldaccini Figurative Sculptures

Napoléon. (Epruve d’artiste EA 1/2) Bocquel fondeur. Acquired directly from the artist. Signed by the artist. César Baldaccini (1921 – 1998) is one of the great sculptors of the twentieth century. As a young man he took a stand for art that was firmly anchored in reality, as a counterweight to the lyrical, abstract painting of the time. He has transformed rusty bolts, screws, scrap metal and steel wire into biomorphic sculptures depicting everything from chickens on roller skates to self-portraits of the artist. In his magical hands, metal from the junk-heap, old car parts, discarded cans and plexiglass have been compacted into delightful cubistic works of art that César himself has called “compressions”. As a kind of antithesis to these, he experimented by expanding plastics, glass, aluminium and bronze into voluptuously inflated forms known as “expansions”. Among César’s casts of sculpted breasts, female torsos and clenched fists, it is the thumb that, above all else, has emerged as the artist’s hallmark – his own, greatly enlarged thumb in bronze. Exhibited for the first time at the Galerie Claude Bernard in Paris in 1965, today you can see it – in bronze or marble – in museums and public places all over the world. His largest bronze thumb, measuring fully 12 metres in height, stands in La Défense in Paris. In similar fashion, the artist’s signature is always accompanied by his thumb print. Born in Marseilles in 1921, by the age of 12 César had already left school to work in his father’s wine merchants business. In 1935, however, he enrolled at the École des Beaux Arts in Marseilles. He continued his art studies in 1943 at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts in Paris, sharing a house for some time with Alberto Giacometti. In 1960 he was invited to join the group of artists known as “les Nouveaux Réalistes”, where he worked together with Arman, Pierre Restany, Niki de Saint Phalle, Jean Tinguely and others. César’s genius lies in his ability to coax artistic forms from whatever materials may be at hand. “When I was a child,” he recalled, “I used to think that a sculptor was a man who chipped away at stone with a hammer and chisel. It was only later that I understood you can make sculptures from any material you choose.” In the early 1940s César discovered the opportunities that scrap metal opened up, and his first solo exhibition, “Animaux en ferraille” (or “Scrap metal animals”), was held at the Galerie Lucien Durand...

1989 Baccarat Crystal. Signed and numbered at the base. Work accompanied by its certificate issued by the Compagnie des Cristalleries Baccarat. Work registered at the Denyse Durand-Ruel Archives under No. 3984. César, French sculpture and member of the "Nouveau Réalisme" movement, is best known for his use of compressed cars and recycled metals. Although his work shows similarities to artists like Andy Warhol in his appropriation of commercial products, César is more interested in the formal traditions of modern sculpture, as for example through the work of Alberto Giacometti. Born César Baldaccini on January 11, 1921 in Marseille to Italian parents, he studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, graduating in 1948. “Despite my classic academic education, I entered the industrial world and learned to approach found materials according to their own language." The artist is at the origin of the creation of the bronze trophies...

Poule Andrée, 1980. Original sculpture, 8 examples + 2 EA (Epreuve d’artiste). Acquired directly from César’s studio in Paris 1987. Signed and numbered EA 2/2. Foundry Bocquel. Reg...

1989 Baccarat Crystal. Signed and numbered 165/300 at the base. Work registered at the Denyse Durand-Ruel Archives under No. 3984. César, French sculpture and member of the "Nouveau...

Signed Essai. Artwork size: 10 x 20 x 9 cm. Size with base 24 x 10 x 5 cm. Bocquel fondeur. Acquired directly from the artist. Free shipment worldwide. César Baldaccini (1921 ...

Size with plexi cover: 40x25x25 cm. Acquired directly from the artist. Signed by the artist. Free shipment worldwide. César Baldaccini (1921 – 1998) is one of the great sculp...

“Petites plaques” Electric plates in aluminium. Signed twice on the side and at the front. 36 x 21 x 6 cm, size with plexiglass hood: 42,5 x 30 x 14 cm. Acquired directly from the a...

Size with plexi cover: 40x25x25 cm. Acquired directly from the artist. Signed by the artist. Free shipment worldwide. César Baldaccini (1921 – 1998) is one of the...