Alberto Giacometti - Selected works from the Collection

Born in 1901 in Switzerland, Alberto Giacmetti moved to Paris (France) in 1922. He set his sights on the Montparnasse district, where he lived and worked until his death in 1966. Despite the almost instant recognition of his work, and the friendship he forged with several personalities such as André Breton, Georges Bataille, André Masson and Michel Leiris, Giacometti quickly turned away from surreal objects that made him famous to refocus on the model. This solitary breakaway, in which he had « no other purpose than to try to set up a human head », let him away from subservience to any movement, preferring to concentrate on the sources of creativity. Supported by his knowledge of prehistoric, ancient Egptian, Sumerian and archaix Greek art, his work combined daily experience of the model with timeless forms of ancient models.