Latest posts tagged with #dated1936 on Bluesky
'Praying Mantis' sculpture
Wood, rod, wire, string, and paint
78" × 51" × 40"
1936
Alexander Calder
#calder #alexandercalder #stabile #sculpture #art #modernart #modernsculpture #abstract #oneofakind #dated1936 #prayingmantis
'The Two Philosophers'
oil on copper
1936
Joan Miró
Spanish, 1893–1983
#joanmiro #art #modernart #painting #modernism #thetwophilosophers #dated1936 #artwork #20thcenturyart #spain #spanishmodernism #spanishmodernist
Claude Cahun, born Lucy Schwob, was closely associated with the Paris Surrealists of the 1930s. Attracted to the group’s desire to transform society through the exploration of the unconscious, she challenged traditional ideas about gender and sexuality through her intimate photographic self-portraits, collages, and sculptures. For Object, Cahun altered a number of seemingly unrelated components—a doll’s hand, a cloud-shaped piece of wood, and a tennis ball painted with a wide-open eye—to produce a startling psychological resonance. The eye, in particular, a key Surrealist symbol of inner perception, also suggests female anatomy. On the base of the work, Cahun added the French phrase, “The Marseillaise is a revolutionary song, the law punishes counterfeiters with forced labor.” Much like the rest of the work, the inscription is a juxtaposition of disparate elements: the first, a well-known slogan from France’s antifascist coalition, the left-wing Popular Front, and the other, a phrase from Belgian currency. In combining these phrases, Cahun seems to point an accusatory finger at the supposed “revolutionary” leaders of France—a rare direct reference to politics in a Surrealist artwork. Her assemblages were typically ephemeral and made to be photographed; Object is the only sculptural work by the artist known to still exist in its original form.
Who? “Under this mask, another mask”. So wrote Claude Cahun, the alter ego of Lucie Schwob, Surrealist writer and photographer. Her writing and art are similarly polymorphous and difficult to categorise, challenging fixed ideas around self-identity and authenticity. Whilst living in Paris, Cahun associated with Man Ray, Salvador Dalí and André Breton – the latter describing her as "one of the most curious spirits of our time" – exhibiting in the Surrealist show at Galerie Ratton in 1936. A year later she moved to Jersey with her partner and step-sister, the illustrator Suzanne Malherbe, who also adopted an alliterative masculine alias and published as Marcel Moore. The pair collaborated in a complex renegotiation of the concept of gender, but with the Nazi invasion of the island in 1940, their creativity was channelled towards resistance – the creation of anti-German flyers which they disseminated while in disguise at military events. Cahun was eventually caught and sentenced to death, and while she escaped this fate thanks to the Allied liberation of Jersey, a year in prison fundamentally damaged her health, leading to her premature death in 1954. What? Following her death, Cahun was as good as excised from the Surrealist roster, remaining largely uncelebrated until the 1980s when her photographs became known. In her photographs she continually reimagines herself in different guises, never settling on a singular identity but encompassing a number of characters. In one photograph, Cahun masquerades as a bodybuilder complete with sewn on nipples and her top reading, "I'm in training – Don’t kiss me." In another she is dressed as a young girl asleep on a shelf of an enormous and ornate armoire. On her release from prison, despite her weakened state, she remains insouciant, brazenly holding a Nazi insignia eagle between her teeth. Complex and beautiful, her photographs are thoughtfully staged vignettes that playfully construct and deconstruct her identity.
Object
collage sculpture
1936
Claude Cahun
French, 1894–1954
#claudcahun #lucyschwob #surrealism #surrealistart #object #dated1936 #collage #sculpture #art #handmade #frenchmodern #modernism #modernart #20thcenturyart #femaleartists #queerart #lesbianart
