Course Description

In his sculpture, painting, drawing, and object-making, Giacometti participated in a sequence of key cultural movements in early to mid-twentieth century Paris. In the twenties, he developed a nearly abstract imagery, in the context of Cubism and Art-Deco. In the early thirties, he joined the Surrealists in their attack on the notion of coherent artistic style, in favor of the creation of idiosyncratic objects evoking dreams and inner realities. From the late thirties through the sixties, he returned to an exacting pursuit of visual sensation, similar in spirit to the motivation of the Impressionists, in works that were seen as manifestations of Existentialism and post-World War II “humanism.� We will read texts by the artist and by literary mentors such as the Surrealist leader Andre Breton and the Existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre that illuminate Giacometti’s art.