Giacometti\’s Art As a Means of Seeing

\”All the art of past rises before me, the art of all ages and all civilizations, everything becomes simultaneous, as if space had replaced time. Memories of works of art blend with affective memories, with my work, with my whole life.\”

Alberto Giacometti

Boundary-breaking sculptors are those who in their own way pushed the medium of sculpture forwards into new, unique territories. Alberto Giacometti is considered one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. His work was mainly influenced by surrealist and cubist art movements. His work was heavily influenced by existential and phenomenological discussions as well as philosophical inquiries into the nature of humanity. He abandoned his Surrealist influences around 1935 in favour of pursuing a more thorough investigation of figurative compositions. Giacometti created prose for publications and exhibition catalogues in addition to keeping journals and notebooks where he put down his ideas and memories. His tendency to be critical resulted in self-doubt about his own work and a belief that he was unable to fully realise his own artistic vision. Despite this, his fears persisted as a strong creative force throughout his entire life.

Alberto Giacometti was born on October 10, 1901 in the mountain hamlet of Borgonovo, eastern Switzerland. He was the first of four children born to Giovanni Giacometti and Annetta Giacometti-Stampa. Giovanni Giacometti was a well-known post-Impressionist painter. Young Alberto and his brother Diego have unrestricted access to their father\’s studio and all the supplies they require to engage in creative expression. Alberto had a natural ability for sketching; his initial creations were lead or coloured pencil illustrations of biblical subjects, but he also created portraits of his family and landscapes of his home valley. He creates a Plasticine portrait of Diego in 1914, which is still the very first sculpture by the artist that has been preserved. Along with doing this, he carves portraits of his classmates, some of which he keeps for the rest of his life. From an early age, he studies the artwork of Hodler, Cézanne, and Gauguin, and his father continues to instruct him over the summers.

For Giacometti, the question of the human head remained a constant focus of his research throughout his life. He was most captivated by the eyes since he believed that they were the centre of human life. Giacometti created Head-Skull in 1934, following the passing of his father in 1933, and then continued to create other variations on heads in the years that followed. Giacometti started experimenting with the idea of the scale at this time. He sought to produce a precise reproduction of his vision, which included depicting the object at the same distance that he had originally seen. Isabel Delmer was one of his first models with whom he tested this realistic subject distance. She was the model for one of his earliest miniature figurines, showing her as he saw her from afar in the Quartier Latin. His unique style of sculpture includes Man Pointing, Man Striding I, and Tall Woman II. Giacometti\’s meticulous portraits include a five-year study of Isabel Lambert and the Portrait of Jean Genet.

Giacometti turned more of his attention to painting in his later years, creating numerous figurative paintings in addition to his sculptures. He was making an effort to depict and convey the vibrancy of the life of his models. His portraits grew more complex as a result of constant conversation between painting and sculpture. On January 11, 1966, Alberto Giacometti passed away at the cantonal hospital in Chur. He is buried in the San Giorgio cemetery not far from Borgonovo and is set out in the Stampa studio.