Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 13

Antique 1920-40 Surrealist Sculpture Unique Set Hammered SteelWire Female Torsos

$24,800
£18,831.23
€21,534.91
CA$34,649.20
A$38,537.47
CHF 20,123.07
MX$468,960.01
NOK 257,002.30
SEK 241,022.82
DKK 160,723.32
Shipping
Retrieving quote...
The 1stDibs Promise:
Authenticity Guarantee,
Money-Back Guarantee,
24-Hour Cancellation

About the Item

This antique Surrealist sculpture set of two one-of-a-kind female figurines was handmade in hammered steel wire with patina estimated as early as the 1920s. Each ribald three-dimensional self-standing torso study of a woman features either three spiral springs (suggesting pregnant belly with large breasts) or convex X-arrangements (defining bra and panties). The dimensions of each sculpture are similar at around 13.5H x 3.5W x 3.5D inches, while the bottom four loops of wire can be slightly adjusted to balance on a tabletop. Although in a figural style distinctly made by the same person, the wound wire patterns on both sculptures do not match in length, tightness, spacing and/or attachment point. Lack of provenance for these apparently unsigned art works has prevented attribution to date. They were acquired from a Chicago-based owner along with haute-couture accessories by 20th-Century European designers dating between the 1920s and 1940s. So ideas have ranged from an Elsa Schiaparelli fashion collaboration to artist Alexander Calder, who also designed thousands of unsigned one-off pieces of costume jewelry and tabletop sculptures from hammered wire.
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 13.4 in (34.04 cm)Width: 3.5 in (8.89 cm)Diameter: 3.5 in (8.89 cm)
  • Style:
    Modern Art (In the Style Of)
  • Place of Origin:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
    Wear consistent with age and use.
  • Seller Location:
    Chicago, IL
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU3244218170132

More From This Seller

View All
YBA YoungBritishArtist Sculpture Jewelry Costume First US Exhibit NYC 2000-2001
By Contemporary
Located in Chicago, IL
Young British artist (YBA) Philippe Bradshaw (1965-2005) was represented by blue-chip international art galleries when he was the first to reimagine iconic-art images as tapestry-like metal-chain installations in evolving multimedia environments. He is best known for transforming hand-assembled colorful anodized-aluminum links into shimmering semi-transparent layered curtains, whose hanging metallic strands uniquely dispersed the light of his camcorder-video projections and the club-house music from records that he deejayed. In Bradshaw's first American exhibition "Disco Damage" in 2001 at New York City's legendary avant-garde art gallery, Deitch Projects, this jewelry-costume sculpture became part of the artist's live-in evolving studio installation. While later celebrating 15 years of art happenings that had occurred at that Soho exhibition space, its gallerist-cum-museum-director Jeffrey Deitch--who was physically scarred during this unforgettable chaotic several-month experience orchestrated by Bradshaw--recounted this show in his retrospective hardcover book "Live The Art". When Bradshaw drowned in the Parisian-river Seine in August 2005 while living the high life of his skyrocketing success in Europe, he left a small body of large installations that is mostly distributed among the world's top private art collections. Notably, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles has acquired one of his multimedia works. More recently, another assembly of his chain curtains made a rare public appearance at new modern-art museum, Heidi Horten Collection, during its inaugural exhibition in Vienna. Since winning a major British visual-art prize in 2000 that marked Bradshaw's art-world ascent following fellow Goldsmiths-College YBAs who were close friends, this sculpture evolved from one of his most elaborate jewelry costumes that he created in London while seducing the American who became his girlfriend. Unlike other pieces of jewelry that he made as gifts to participating acquaintances while video taping...
Category

Early 2000s British Contemporary Figurines and Sculptures

Materials

Mixed Metal

Unique Vintage Handcrafted Hammered 6BrassWires SpiralsLoopsSquiggles Pendant
Located in Chicago, IL
This vintage handcrafted brass-wire pendant was shaped and hammered into lively three-dimensional spirals, loops and squiggles with wrapped construction by an unknown 20th-Century st...
Category

Mid-20th Century European Modernist Pendant Necklaces

Materials

Brass

Unique MidCentury Handcrafted Hammered 6BrassWires SpiralsLoopsSquiggles Pendant
Located in Chicago, IL
This vintage handcrafted brass-wire pendant was shaped and hammered into lively three-dimensional spirals, loops and squiggles with wrapped construction by an unknown 20th-Century st...
Category

Mid-20th Century European Modernist Pendant Necklaces

Materials

Brass

Artist Modern Sculptural SterlingSilverWire Script Letter H or Acrobat Pendant
Located in Chicago, IL
Like Alexander Calder's handmade wire jewelry since 1929, whose smallest one-of-a-kind sculptural subjects ranged from aerial acrobats and dancers to mono...
Category

Mid-20th Century American Modern Figurines and Sculptures

Materials

Sterling Silver

Artist 1980s NevelsonStyle Sculptural GiltMetal Crushed Jagged Pendant Necklace
By Contemporary
Located in Chicago, IL
Louise Nevelson, an American modern sculptor who enhanced found objects throughout the 20th Century, in the 1980s transformed crushed and gilt metal in...
Category

Vintage 1980s American Artist Pendant Necklaces

Materials

Brass, Gilt Metal

Artist BertoiaStyle Hammered SterlingSilver SquiggleSpiral UndulatingWire Brooch
Located in Chicago, IL
Strongly resembling the Harry Bertoia Foundation's archived c.1947 unsigned small brooch (D.JE.27) that is essentially an elegant hammered silver curvilinear three-humped squiggle by...
Category

Early 20th Century American Modern Brooches

Materials

Sterling Silver

You May Also Like

Art Deco Wire Work Shop Display Mannequin A Quirky piece of Deco design
Located in Godshill, Isle of Wight
Art Deco Wire Work Shop Display Mannequin A Quirky piece of Deco design, this mannequin is small but full height, and a wire work form in pink The mannequin is 61” tall and 16” a...
Category

Vintage 1930s Art Deco Busts

Materials

Wire

Pair of Brutalist Metal Torso Sculptures
Located in North Bergen, NJ
Pair of Mid-Century male and female metal torso sculptures. Very interesting and something you dont see everyday.
Category

Vintage 1970s Mid-Century Modern Metalwork

Pair of Brutalist Metal Torso Sculptures
$2,800 Sale Price / set
20% Off
Wire Sculpture of a Lascivious Woman
Located in Pasadena, CA
Wire sculpture, a medium known for its inherent rigidity and masculinity, has been transformed - in this unique sculpture that we propose today - into a triumphant tribute to the gra...
Category

Late 20th Century American Figurative Sculptures

Materials

Wire

Jean Paul Gaultier Wire Dress Form Mannequin
By Jean Paul Gaultier
Located in Los Angeles, CA
An iconic and collectible wirework dress form mannequin by legendary French designer Jean Paul Gaultier, created in the 1990s. This sculptural piece exemplifies Gaultier’s bold, avan...
Category

1990s French Post-Modern Figurative Sculptures

Materials

Steel

Pair Vintage Metal Mannequins Architectural Salvage
Located in Potters Bar, GB
Wonderful pair of vintage metal mannequins These were salvaged from a shop in North London and would make for a great decorative pair Please let us kno...
Category

Vintage 1950s Antiquities

Materials

Metal

Magnificent Spanish Sculpture "Woman's Body" 20th Century
Located in Madrid, ES
Magnificent Spanish Sculpture "Woman's Body" 20th Century golden metal 85cm x 40cm metallic base Perfect condition
Category

20th Century Spanish Modern Figurative Sculptures

Materials

Metal