Alberto Giacometti

He got married with Annette Arm. Alberto Giacometti passed away in Kantonsspital in Chur, Switzerland. He was suffering from heart disease and chronic bronchitis.

The Alberto Giacometti-Stiftung, founded in Zurich 1965, has a collection of his works. In 2001, his paintings were included in the Painting the Century 101 Portrait Masterpieces 1900-2000 exhibition held at the National Portrait Gallery, London.

The Alberto et Annette Giacometti Foundation was created in 2003, to promote, preserve and protect the works of Alberto Giacometti. It has almost 5,000 of his works.

Born in Borgonovo, which is presently a part of the Swiss municipality of Stampa, near the Italian border, Alberto Giacometti was the son of neo-impressionist painter Giovanni Giacometti.

He attended Ecole des Beaux-Arts for art studies. In 1919, he took admission at the Ecole des Arts Industriels in Geneva. After three years, he went to Paris to attend sculpting class of Antoine Bourdelle at the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere

In 1925, he started his first studio with his brother in Paris. His sculpting style was lavish and spacious. During this period of time, he developed an interest towards the surrealist movement.

In 1927, he displayed his first surrealist sculptures at the Salon des Tuileries. At that time, he came in contact with artists like Picasso, Arp, Miro and Ernst. He also met with renowned writers like Prevert, Aragon and Queneau.

From 1935 to 1940, he remained busy on the study of human head for which he used to focus on the sitter’s gaze. For this purpose, he used his sister and the artist Isabel Rawsthorne as his models.

In some of his sculptures, his statues of Isabel are stretched out as her limbs are elongated. Sometimes, he used to create statues as thin as nails.

The figures that he drew during this time were smaller. Sometimes, their size was not bigger than just a few centimeters. Along with his brother, he used to earn by making designs for lamps and furniture for the Parisian interior architect Jean-Michel Frank.

Along with his image, this famous artist’s sculptor “L'Homme qui marche I” appears on the present 100 Swiss Franc banknote. It was he, who created a tree for the set of “Waiting For Godot”, a play authored by Samuel Beckett.