Sculpture de Silence, Corneille

The work is in rose-coloured limestone, an unusual material, given the artist’s usual preference for bronze or marble in the creation of his sculptures. “Sculpture of silence, Corneille” is aligned with the three-dimensional exploration initiated by Arp in 1930-31, originating from a creative process closer to a spontaneous organic germination of forms than a stylised manifestation of a natural fact. Of his works from this period, Silence (1942) is the sculpture that comes closest to it, albeit with the utmost formal abbreviation. The work was created by the artist during his exile due to the German occupation of Paris, divided, in 1942, between Grasse and Zurich. Another version of the sculpture, in the same material, is preserved in the J. Lazard collection in Paris.