Alexander Archipenko's work at first
glance and to fresh eyes of the 21st century seems cliched
and old hat.
This is because, like many artists such
as Mondrian and numerous others that we thought of as modern, it has
been copied over and over again by plagiarists.
So why does his name stand the test of
time and be linked with some of the greats?
And where from where did his
inspiration occur, was it original?
But in asking this question, we must
remember that in the age it was made, there was a seed change that
reflected a modernity, before the word had been invented.
Nobody was aware what would last at the
time.
And this environment was fighting with
the old.
Put in context of the Glasgow school
with its entrallic and linear forms of new art or Art Nouveau, it is
as if from another planet.
The Vienna Secessionists were moving
the art nouveau of old and making the link to the Bauhaus.
Early in the century there were several
experimentalists such as Picasso and Braque who were adopting new
styles and these along with other modernists fed into each other and
inspired all those who came around them.
Paris was the hub of the
impressionists, but almost nothing could have seen this coming if you
look at art from a decade earlier.
Much has been written about how they
all may have tried to capture the primitive art of tribal masks and
oceanic totem, with or without knowing what they were doing.
Picasso collage of 1912 “Still Life
With Chair Caning” is tipped in, as the first time collage on paper
was used.
The multi layered use of collage may
have inspired Archipenko. Will we ever know?
Alexander Archipenko was born in Kiev
in 1887. He died in 1964.
He studied in Kiev Art School from 1902
to 1905 but in 1906 he went to Moscow.
Archipenko left for Paris in 1908 where
he visited the great museums.
He studied for a year in the Ecole Des
Beaux Arts in Paris where he started exhibiting, but his first one
man Exhibition which was held in Hagen in 1910.
He also exhibited in Berlin and several
other German cities.
Archipenko's work, it is said was a
form of constructivism based on cubist forms and the parring down and
streamlining of shape and form. His sculpto painting shows us a
understanding of the inner phsyce. So it has been said.
Archipenko's grandfather was a Icon
painter.
By inspiration he used a brilliance of
colour, in his work. Deep reds, orange and gold which are dominant
colours of the Novgorod School from where his inner inspiration
probably came. His interpretation of these ancient forms into the
secular makes his work seem even more provocative.
But also this shows us that it is those
who believe, in image and who absorb the image of an icon, whether it
be religious or secular are possibly accepting something similar in
reflection.
Like his contemporaries such as Brancusi,
who preceded him to Paris and Jacques Lipchitz who left Lithuania to
study in Paris, but returned to Russia for Military service in 1912,
he entered adventurous paths that had opened up for budding artists
with the desire and dedication to succeed.
He replaced form with hollows and
concave materials in these sculpto paintings that it was said he
invented in the early twenties worked by incorporating and using
metal and glass.
His use of cut conical shapes made the
concavity that he desired.
This also worked in convex and his use
of perspective was sometimes made simply with painted lines.
In 1914 he travelled to Nice where he
saw out the war.
During this time his work was entrusted
in storage to his friend Ferdinand Leger who was conscipted.
Though with his absence and lack of
care for them, moisture entered the shed in Paris and his paper mache
constructions were ruined.
In a separate storage some of his work
that had been exhibited in America at the Royal Armoury show in New
York were destroyed by long range German bombardment.
He was often ridiculed in France, as
were quite a lot of the adventurists who we now see as pioneers of
modern art.
Though when hostilities ceased he sent
a lot of this accumulation of work to Germany and Switzerland.
He opened a school in Paris and taught
others how to interpret his use of the experimental.
In the 1920's his work in Germany was
thought akin to that of Picasso's, and his work entered numerous
museum and gallery collections such as Essen, Mannheim, Frankfurt and
Berlin.
His execution of a series of
brilliantly coloured lithographs were produced by the Ernst Wasmuth
publishing house.
In 1921 he closed down the Paris
Atelier and moved to Berlin marryng a German sculptor Angelica
Bruno-Schmitz.
In the same year Kandinsky arrived to
the new 'hub' from Moscow and Chagall from Paris.
His work was amassed by collectors such
as G. Falk from Geneva inculding polychromed plasters and terracotta
sculptures along with work in Bronze.
Another misfortune destroyed a lot more
of his work the “Entartete Kunst” exhibition of 1936 opened by
Hitler and Goebbels that triggered a vast confiscation of works
deemed degenerate. Thousands of works of art during this period were
destroyed and lucrative works made auctions. Not many of Archopenko's
work found its way onto the market and was lost.
He had moved to America in 1923 with
his wife and on the voyage on the S.S Mongolia, with them were trunks
laden with his work.
A lot of this work would be acquired by
the Gugginheim Museum in 1956.
A second fortunate act was kind to his
work when his patrons Mr and Mrs Goeritz who had bought a huge amount
of his work, when new, sent it to Tel Aviv then in Palestine and thus
it escaped the ravages of World war II. So did Archipenko, as there
is no doubt what fate he would have met if he was still living in
Germany when the Nazis came to power.
In 1955 and upto the death of Goeritz
it was held in almost obscurity in vaults awaiting the family to
gift most of the collection to Tel Aviv museum and in 1971 it finally
opened with these works going on display.
In 1970 a retrospective of Archipenko's
work was organised by Alfred Barr Jr and was held in the Museum of
Modern Art. This cemented his role in modern sculpture.
I feel you have to look at the works in
a different place inside your mind and take out all those works which
have subliminally copied his, to see if it has any worth.
Yes I know art, like music is a
culmination of what has gone before it and Archipenko himself
absorbed much around him either by stealth or by default, but we
still need to ask questions.
It is obvious that he believed in
himself and needed to make a name for himself, either during his
lifetime or at a later date.
So is he one of the most important
artists of the first half of the twentieth century?
Or only one of the pieces in giant
jigsaw?
That we are only still piecing together and will not understand the full picture for some time but in the meantime the Tel Aviv museum continues to display his work from the period 1910 to 1921 having over 30 pieces. So he is assured the continued attention, and maybe its fitting.
This month February 2015 sees a pair of his paintings go on sale in New York.
Portrait of a Woman with an estimate of $75,000 to $90,000, and Nude Torso,with a $75,000 to $225,000.
I myself look at these in image form in
the catalogue and think, well its all in the name. And that name is
Archipenko, and someone or some institution will probably pay the
money.
Maybe the Tel Aviv institution may add them to their collection.
Maybe the Tel Aviv institution may add them to their collection.
One think is certain, that his name will continue to be around for a long time.
But Modern Master......well I am not
sure too about that.
