ALBERTO
GIACOMETTI
L’homme au doigt
Published: Christie’s Inc., May 2015
Loic Gouzer and Candace Wetmore, Editors
Amela Kazazovic, Design
Laura Klar Phillips, Text
Archival Texts by Albert Camus, Alberto Giacometti, and Jean-Paul Sartre
Archival Interview with Pierre Schneider and Alberto Giacometti
The Sculpture.
Alberto Giacometti’s L’homme au doigt sold for a record $141,285,000, making it the most expensive sculpture ever sold at auction.
The Book.
Published to coincide with the sale of Alberto Giacometti’s L’homme au doigt at Christie’s New York in May 2015, this unique publication delves into existentialist thinking in art and literature. Featured in this volume is an original text on one of Giacometti’s most iconic sculptures, as well as a focus on archival material aimed to transport the reader to postwar Paris. In addition to a letter and interview with the postwar sculptor, writings by Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus’ Myth of Sisyphus are featured. This dark volume features cutting-edge photography and a visual index of human condition throughout the history of art, as well as archival images tracing L’homme au doigt through its conception, execution, provenance, and exhibition history.
“I can consider separately from the tree itself this wavering branch, but I cannot think of an arm rising, a fist closing, apart from a human agent. A man raises his arm, a man clenches his fist; a man is the indissoluble unity and the absolute source of his movments.”
— Jean-Paul Sartre