Niki de Saint Phalle
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'Mini Nana Acrobate'.
Signed Niki de Saint Phalle. Pencil, crayon and acrylic on resin. Height 18.3 cm, width 18 cm, and depth 9 cm. A certificate of authenticity executed by Niki Charitable Art Foundation is included with the lot.
More information
The 1966 exhibition 'SHE-a Cathedral' at Moderna Museet in Stockholm showcased the ultimate Nana, a monumental reclining figure that Saint Phalle created with Jean Tinguely and P O Ultvedt. SHE was a symbol of the independent Nana and was a cathedral that housed an entire exhibition hall. Saint Phalle was responsible for the exterior and the other two for the interior. Through the womb of this giant woman, over 20 meters tall, the audience entered a fantastic world with a cinema, a bar, a slide and various moving sculptures.
Today, the sculpture group Paradise, with the monumental Nanas, stands outside Moderna Museet. The work was created for the World Exhibition in Montreal and then donated to the museum in Stockholm.
Niki de Saint Phalle's Nana sculptures first appeared in 1964 after she was inspired by her pregnant friend Clarice Rivers. Initially made from yarn, papier-mâché and wire, Saint Phalle later made them in polyester. They are curvaceous, colorful female figures that are happy, liberated, godlike women, foreshadowing a new matriarchal era. Saint Phalle also executed several Nanas painted in black and white as a reaction to the Civil Rights Movement in the United States and as an expression of the artist's belief that all women are goddesses, regardless of color.
Artist
Niki De Saint Phalle (1930-2002) was a self-taught French painter, sculptor, and film producer. She moved to Mallorca in 1955, and during a visit to Barcelona and Madrid, came in contact with Anotnio Gaudi’s art. This had a huge impact on her own art making and opened unforeseen possibilities for her development as an artist. In particular, it was Gaudi’s “Park Guell” which convinced her to create her own monumental sculpture park, which she bogh the land for in 1979 in Tuscany. The garden “Giardino dei Tarocchi” stood finished in 1998 and displays sculptures of icons drawn from the Tarot cad deck.
For a period, Saint Phalle explored various roles of women by creating life-sized doll-like models. They were normally dressed in white and made of papier maché. They were called Nanas and were presented in Paris in 1965. In the following year, Saint Phalle collaborated with her colleagues Jan Tinguely and Per Olof Ultvedt for a project at Moderna Museet in Stockholm, where they created the well-known sculpture exhibition “Her – A Cathedral”. This giant Nana sculpture had an entrance through its legs where one could walk inside of her. “She” awake a grand reaction across the globe. She eventually married Jean Tinguely in 1971.