After his expulsion from the Surrealist movement in
the mid-1930s, some people felt Alberto Giacometti was giving up the power and
originality of his work by returning to figurative art. Beyond the obvious
formal discontinuity, however, a certain permanence in his approach to his work
and to reality reveals a structural continuity between his Surrealist period
and the aftermath. Taking the concepts of "dialectic" and "fetishism" as his points of departure, Raphaël Pirenne establishes
a set of enduring links between Giacometti’s approaches to production,
conceptual systems and plastic effects, above and beyond the artist’s
ostensible break with the Surrealists. Using the concept of "negative
dialectic" forged by the German
philosopher Theodor W. Adorno, Pirenne brings out the latent presence of a
critical force in Giacometti's work that grew out of a wider ideological and
political context. This force may be seen as a form of “fetishism at work”
insofar as each of the artist's productions and gestures seeks to renew his relationship
to reality and the Other.
Author: Raphaël Pirenne
Graphic design: Studio Otamendi
Published in 2018
In French
13 x 19 cm
168 pages
ISBN: 978-2-93066-717-1
EAN: 9782930667171
