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Lot Essay
Françoise Guiter will include this work in the upcoming Richier Catalogue Raisonné in preparation and we are grateful for her assistance.
'Germaine Richier has [in my opinion] created a wonderful statue, which she calls La Montagne, but which would be better named, because of the cavern or grotto which it containsthe Egg of the World'
(J. Paulhan, quoted in G. Limbour, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162)
One of the largest sculptures that Germaine Richier ever created, this immense pair of duelling chimera are exemplary examples of her unique sculptural language. These creations - the half-human/half-animal amalgams that inhabit an unknown world - clash violently with their long, sinewy limbs acting as both weapons, and paradoxically, as their support to stop their bodies from falling over. Powerfully expressive, in terms of both form and texture, these creatures portray the haunting and deeply moving battle for survival that humanity has faced throughout its history and as such, the sculpture conveys a universal message to which we can all relate.
La Montagne was conceived for the artist's landmark retrospective at the Musée d'Art Modern in Paris in 1956. Despite its size, this sculpture undoubtedly derives from her earlier series of smaller Trios sculptures which were inspired, in part, by her observations of a group of French agricultural workers using traditional long handled farming tools . a Montagne's large size is testimony to Richier's new desire to organise relationships between her characters, whose metamorphosis is such that only the barest resemblances to humans are left, even though she was still using human models at the time. For this particular piece she used her favourite model, Nardone who she also used as the model for another sculpture, L'Ogre - see lot 43), as the source for the fleshy contours of the bulbous figure. Richier described the resulting figures as 'fantastic creatures from an age which we are incapable of recognising, but which is ours, since the world of forms increasingly arises from our research and observation' (Germaine Richier, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162). A major work by Richier, this sculpture is in the permanent collection of several major European museums including the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris, Foundation Maeght in Saint-Paul and the Sprengel Museum in Hannover.
The broken and haunting forms fashioned by Richier in La Montagne are, in part, her response to her wartime experiences in Europe. At the outbreak of the Second World War, Richier and her first husband Otto Banninger had been holidaying in Switzerland and had decided to stay for the duration of the war. In Switzerland Richier came into contact with a new group of artists among them Alberto Giacometti and Marino Marini whose influence along with the impact of the war profoundly altered the direction of her work. Returning to Paris in 1946, Richier began work on a new series of sculptures whose startling originality marked her maturation as a sculptor and established her work as amongst the most powerfully expressive art being created in Europe. The resulting intertwining natural forms, abstraction and references to enduring human symbols that appear in La Montagne mark the perfect balance between timelessness and modernity, between universal, eternal themes and the contemporary existentialism that gripped Richier's war-weary generation. SJ
'Germaine Richier directly borrows elements from the natural worldthese borrowings lead to a great anti-naturalistic work of imposing size, quite dizzying in the chasm that it partly opens....The intrusion was to lead to a very vast monument which we see here, cast in pale bronze, with a light patina. La Montagne, an enigmatic monument at first, evoking mysterious natural forces and the formidable abysses where cataclysms and metamorphoses hatch'
(Georges Limbour, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162)
'Germaine Richier has [in my opinion] created a wonderful statue, which she calls La Montagne, but which would be better named, because of the cavern or grotto which it containsthe Egg of the World'
(J. Paulhan, quoted in G. Limbour, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162)
One of the largest sculptures that Germaine Richier ever created, this immense pair of duelling chimera are exemplary examples of her unique sculptural language. These creations - the half-human/half-animal amalgams that inhabit an unknown world - clash violently with their long, sinewy limbs acting as both weapons, and paradoxically, as their support to stop their bodies from falling over. Powerfully expressive, in terms of both form and texture, these creatures portray the haunting and deeply moving battle for survival that humanity has faced throughout its history and as such, the sculpture conveys a universal message to which we can all relate.
La Montagne was conceived for the artist's landmark retrospective at the Musée d'Art Modern in Paris in 1956. Despite its size, this sculpture undoubtedly derives from her earlier series of smaller Trios sculptures which were inspired, in part, by her observations of a group of French agricultural workers using traditional long handled farming tools . a Montagne's large size is testimony to Richier's new desire to organise relationships between her characters, whose metamorphosis is such that only the barest resemblances to humans are left, even though she was still using human models at the time. For this particular piece she used her favourite model, Nardone who she also used as the model for another sculpture, L'Ogre - see lot 43), as the source for the fleshy contours of the bulbous figure. Richier described the resulting figures as 'fantastic creatures from an age which we are incapable of recognising, but which is ours, since the world of forms increasingly arises from our research and observation' (Germaine Richier, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162). A major work by Richier, this sculpture is in the permanent collection of several major European museums including the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris, Foundation Maeght in Saint-Paul and the Sprengel Museum in Hannover.
The broken and haunting forms fashioned by Richier in La Montagne are, in part, her response to her wartime experiences in Europe. At the outbreak of the Second World War, Richier and her first husband Otto Banninger had been holidaying in Switzerland and had decided to stay for the duration of the war. In Switzerland Richier came into contact with a new group of artists among them Alberto Giacometti and Marino Marini whose influence along with the impact of the war profoundly altered the direction of her work. Returning to Paris in 1946, Richier began work on a new series of sculptures whose startling originality marked her maturation as a sculptor and established her work as amongst the most powerfully expressive art being created in Europe. The resulting intertwining natural forms, abstraction and references to enduring human symbols that appear in La Montagne mark the perfect balance between timelessness and modernity, between universal, eternal themes and the contemporary existentialism that gripped Richier's war-weary generation. SJ
'Germaine Richier directly borrows elements from the natural worldthese borrowings lead to a great anti-naturalistic work of imposing size, quite dizzying in the chasm that it partly opens....The intrusion was to lead to a very vast monument which we see here, cast in pale bronze, with a light patina. La Montagne, an enigmatic monument at first, evoking mysterious natural forces and the formidable abysses where cataclysms and metamorphoses hatch'
(Georges Limbour, quoted in J.L. Prat (ed.), Germaine Richier: Rétrospective, Paris, 1996, p. 162)