Alexander Archipenko

(Kiev 1887–1964 New York) Kneeling, c. 1925/26, bronze, brown patina, signed Archipenko, 21.8 x 7.2 x 10.6 cm, on an artificial stone socle 7.5 x 6 x 10 cm bolted, (PS)

Confirmation of authenticity:
The Archipenko Foundation, New York, Frances Archipenko Gray, 23.3.2011. ‘The work, as described above, was created by Alexander Archipenko in his lifetime. It is part of an unnumbered lifetime bronze edition and will be included in the catalogue raisonné of his work.’

Lterature:
see Anette Barth, Alexander Archipenkos plastisches Oeuvre, part 2, Frankfurt 1997, cat. raisonné. no. 171 (gilded version)

“It is creative forces that give Archipenko’s art its direction. ... Colours and lights glide over the forms that have become human and appear to permeate them. The concavities, the complementary forms, the differentiation of planes, the recesses and elevations that are never sharply delineated, grow into vivid stone that is lent sculptural expression by the passionate fall of the chisel.’ (in: Karshan, Donald H. (ed.), Archipenko ein internationaler Visionär, Washington 1969, page 11)
These words by Guillaume Apollinaire, written on the occasion of Archipenko’s first solo exhibition in Hagen in 1912, are not limited to the works he produced before the First World War, but apply to the artist’s entire oeuvre. In 1923 Archipenko travelled to America, where he taught at various art schools, at first in New York and then later in Washington. His artistic aims can be seen in the machine-like representation of the human body with abstract elements. The sculptures executed in America, as in the case of Kneeling, no longer feature the negative space, characteristic of Archipenko’s oeuvre from 1910, but have become closed, flowing bodies. The plasticity and the shift between convex and concave forms is further intensified in the play of light on the polished surfaces.

专家: Dr. Petra Maria Schäpers