Eric Grate

Acquired at The Art Institute of Chicago in 1964.
Christie's, New York, sale 2644, 16 July 2012, cat no. 151.
Private collection, Sweden. (Acquired at the above).

Norrköpings Museum, "Eric Grates metamorfoser", 24 September - 19 October 1960, cat no. 37.
Musée National D'art Moderne, Paris, "Eric Grate", 22 March - 15 April 1963, cat no. 54.
Musée d'lxelles, Bryssel, "Eric Grate", 7 June - 7 July 1963, cat no. 54.
National Hoger Instituut en Koninklijke Academie van Antwerpen, 23 July - 18 August 1963, cat no. 54.

Pontus Grate och Ragnar von Holten "Eric Grate", 1978, p. 108.

Eric Grates idiosyncratic world of images always invites exploration and wandering within the imagination. While he respects the the earths natural forms, he sometimes "plays with god", manipulating and playing with nature to create new surprising objects which we recognise but simultaneously dont recall. He borrows fragments from nature and uses his endless imagination to create art in his unique way. His visual language emualtes an aura of abstract surrealism derived from "object trouvés". Grate was inspired by natures radiance and its different forms. Stones, roots, insects, bones, all were transformed into sculptures, particularly the insect world was a source of great inspiration for Grates. During the 1960s, beach, hull, and bones were particularly the starting points for his sculptures. He created numerous official artworks.

Grate began his academic trips after finishing his studies at Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts from 1979-20, where he travelled to Italy and Greece, filling his sketchbooks with studies of insects, plants, unique architecture, sculpture, and ceramics. He spent a longer period between 1924 and 1933 in Paris, a formative period where he was one of the few Swedish artists who was associated with the avante garde; we got in contact with none other than the surrealists Jean Arp, Paul Eluard, and Tristan Tzara. Grate is seen by many as one of Sweden's most influential sculptors during the 1900s.